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'BY  THE  SAME  , AUTHOR. ■ 

SUNDAY  OBSERVANCE  AND  SUNDAY  LAW; 

together  with  Six  Sermons  on  the  Sabbath  Question 
by  the  late  George  B.  Bacon. 

THE  SIMPLICITY  THAT  IS  IN  CHRIST  :  Sermons 
to  the  Woodland  Church,  Philadelphia. 

IN  TREPANATION  : 

ETHICS  AND  POLITICS  :  Papers  pertaining  to  good 
morals  and  good  government,  including,  among 
others  : — 

The  Defeat  of  Party  Despotism  by  the  rehabilitation 
of  the  Individual  Citizen  :  an  argument  for  Majority 
Elections. 

The  Mistakes  and  Failures  of  the  Temperance 
Reformation. 

License  Legislation,  especially  in  its  application  to 
Liquor-Selling. 

Prohibition,  so-called. 

Polygamy  in  New  England. 

Divorce-Reform. 

The  Morality  of  Creed  Subscription. 


IRENICS  and  POLEMICS 


WITH    SUNDRY 


Essays  in  Church  History 


BY 


LEONARD  WOOLSEY  BACON 


- 


*    •> » 


*      '  >    J  *  « 


New  York  : 
THE  CHRISTIAN  LITERATURE  CO. 

1895 


9  3'' 


Copyright,  1895,  by 
THE  CHRISTIAN  LITERATURE  CO. 


t 


CONTENTS 


***  The  several  papers  comprised  in  this  volume  stand  in  the 
order  in  which  they  were  published,  or  republished,  in  the  "Chris- 
tian Literature  "  Magazine.  In  the  following  table,  the  titles  are 
disposed  in  a  more  logical  order  : 


IRENICS  AND  POLEMICS 

Page 

The  American  Church  and  the  Primitive  Church  .  225 
Five  Theories  of  the  Church  ....  239 
The  Restoration  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal 

Church  to  Catholic  Fellowship  .  .  27} 
How  the  Reverend  Doctor  Stone  bettered  his 

Situation 57 

ESSAYS  IN  CHURCH  HISTORY 

The  Real  Prisoner  of  Chillon  (1496-1 570) .         .  109 

Concerning  the  Use  of  Fagots  at  Geneva  (1555)  20s 

Two  Sides  to  a  Saint  (1567-1622)  1 

William  Lloyd  Garrison  (1805-1879)          .         .  14s 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT 


This  historical  essay,  written  at  Geneva,  was  published 
in  Macmillari's  Magazine,  London,  for  September,  1878, 
and  has  since  been  reissued  as  a  pamphlet  at  Lausanne, 
Switzerland,  with  the  consent  both  of  author  and  of  pub- 
lishers. 

On  its  first  appearance,  it  was  the  subject  of  very  se- 
rious attention  in  England  and  America,  from  critics  of 
very  different  schools.  The  London  Academy  declared  it 
to  be  "  one  of  the  most  telling  and  vigorous  pieces  of  his- 
torical criticism  that  we  have  met  with  for  a  long  time," 
and  concluded,  "  in  a  word,  this  article  is  one  which  the 
apologists  of  St.  Francis  and  his  '  sweetness  '  will  do  well 
to  answer.  If  they  pass  it  by,  the  world  may  well  be  ex- 
cused for  believing  that  it  is  unanswerable. "  In  like  man- 
ner, the  London  Church  Times,  from  the  opposite  point  of 
view,  representing  the  party  that  has  been  devoted  to  the 
cult  of  St.  Francis,  recognized  the  seriousness  of  the  issue, 
and  came  to  the  same  conclusion, "  unless  Mr.  Bacon's  ar- 
ticle is  answered,  we  shall  have  to  give  up  St.  Francis  de 
Sales." 

Well,  more  than  sixteen  years  have  passed,  and  the 
article  is  still  "  unanswered  because  unanswerable  ;  "  but 
we  are  still  waiting  for  indications  that  this  prostrate  and 
discredited  idol,  so 

k4  Lopp'd,  maim'd  and  battered  on  the  grundsel  edge," 
is  any  the  less   an   object  of  veneration  to  its  English 
votaries. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 


The  titles  given  below  are  far  from  rep- 
resenting all  that  has  lately  been  published 
in  England  on  the  subject  of  St.  Francis  de 
Sales.  The  amount  and  character  of  this 
literature  indicate  a  degree  of  reverent 
interest  in  that  remarkable  man  almost 
amounting  to  a  new  cultus.  The  feeling  is 
manifested,  not  only  by  the  authors  of  these 
books  (in  whom  something  is  to  be  par- 
doned to  the  enthusiasm  of  biography),  but 
also  by  the  readers  and  critics,  that  in  the 
person  of  "the  Apostle  of  the  Chablais," 
we  have  a  type  of  sanctified  humanity  quite 
superior  to  anything  that  can  be  expected 
from  the  English  stock,  and  which  mere 
Protestantism   cannot    attain   unto.      Now 

*  St.  Francis  de  Sales,  Bishop  and  Prince  of  Geneva. 
By  the  author  of  A  Dominican  Artist.    Rivingtons,  1876. 

A  Selection  from  the  Spiritual  Letters  of  St.  Francis  de 
Sales.  Translated  bv  the  same  author.  Rivingtons, 
1871. 

The  Spirit  of  St  Francis  de  Sales.  By  Jeau  Pierre 
Camus,  Bishop  of  Belley.  Translated  by  the  same  author. 
Rivingtons,  1872. 

The  Mission  of  St.  Francis  of  Sales  in  the  Chablais.  By 
Lady  Herbert.    Bentley,  1868. 

Selections  from,  tlie  Letters  of  St.  Francis  de  Sales. 
Translated  from  the  French  bv  Mrs.  C.  W.  Bagot.  Re- 
vised by  a  Priest  of  the  English  Church.    Masters,  1871. 

The  "  Salesian  "  literature  in  French,  always  volumi- 
nous, has  received  unusual  increments  of  late,  in  conse- 
quence of  the  project,  just  accomplished,  for  constituting 
St.  Francis  a  "  doctor  of  the  Church.1' 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 


there  is  nothing  but  good  to  be  said  of  the 
naturalization  of  foreign  saints,  provided 
only  it  be  done  with  discretion  and  fidelity 
to  historic  truth.  But  there  is  large  scope 
here  for  the  function  of  the  avvocato  del  dia- 
volo ;  and  we  are  bound  to  say  of  all  these 
books  that  they  are  wholly  negligent  of  this 
duty.  The  Francis  de  Sales  whom  they 
present  to  us  is  neither  the  legendary  Fran- 
cis nor  the  historical  Francis.  The  blaze  of 
color  which  characterizes  the  legend  is  toned 
down  to  suit  the  English  taste,  though  no 
attempt  is  made  to  correct  the  drawing. 
Not  even  Lady  Herbert's  Mission  in  the 
Chablais  ventures  to  reproduce  that  wild 
profusion  of  miracle,  and  those  unctuous  de- 
tails concerning  the  saint's  resistance  to 
temptation,  in  which  his  panegyrists  so  much 
delight.  Not  even  the  author  of  A  Domin- 
ican Artist,  in  whose  writings  appear  so 
many  indications  of  industry  and  good 
taste,  ventures  on  anything,  with  regard  to 
the  facts  of  her  hero's  life,  but  a  servile 
though  distant  and  timid  following  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  tradition. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  go  beyond  Francis's 
own  letters  and  the  documents  of  his  friends 
and  partisans  for  the  materials  for  correct- 
ing these  distorted  representations  ;  and  it 
is  not  creditable  to   intelligent  writers  who 


TWO   SIDES  TO   A   SAINT. 


have  had  these  materials  under  their  eyes, 
to  persist  in   repeating  the  old   fiction  as 
truth.     A    less  labor-saving  course    would 
not  only  be  more  honorable  to  themselves, 
and  more  just  to  their  readers,  but  it  would 
not   be   in  all  respects  disadvantageous  to 
their  hero.     He  would  doubtless  lose  some 
rays    of  the  halo   that  envelops  him ;  he 
might  be  constrained  to  descend  a  step  or 
two  from  that  lofty  pedestal  on  which  he 
seems  sometimes  to  be  consciously  posing 
for  a  saint ;  and   certainly  there  would  be 
some  qualifying  of  that  preternatural  sweet- 
ness which    (to  the   Protestant   taste)  ap- 
proaches now  and  then  the  very  verge  of 
mawkishness ;    but   whatever   his    portrait 
might  lose  in  heroic  dimensions  and  in  the 
air  of  sanctity,  not  to  say  sanctimony,  it 
would  gain  in  human  interest  and  probabil- 
ity.    In  the  early  pages  of  his  biography, 
we  should  miss  that  solemn  little  prig  de- 
scribed in  the  bull  of  canonization  as  having 
"shown  when  a  child  none  of  the  traits  of 
childhood, "  and  in  the   eulogy   of  Father 
Morel  as  "having  manifested  in  the  cradle 
such  chaste  modesty  as  to  shrink  from  the 
caresses  of  his  nurse,  and  hardly  permit  her 
to  kiss  him  ;  "*  and  in  the  later  chapters  we 

*  Canonisation  de  St.  Frangois  de  Sales,  en  16  discours. 
Grenoble,  1665. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 


should  part  with  more  regret  from  the  fig" 
ure  of  "  the  Apostle  of  the  Chablais/ '  taking 
his  life  in  his  hand  and  encountering  the 
lofty  mountains  of  the  Chablais,  its  fright- 
ful precipices,  its  eternal  winters,  its  fero- 
cious beasts  and  still  more  savage  inhabi- 
tants, opposing  the  malignity  and  heresy  of 
the  latter  only  with  the  arms  of  love  and 
meekness,  and  with  the  eloquent  preaching 
of  the  true  faith,  until  "  at  last  his  gentle- 
ness triumphed  over  their  brutality,  his  love 
over  their  hate,  his  patience  over  their  fury, 
his  constancy  to  serve  them  over  their  ob- 
stinacy."* But  we  should  get  in  exchange 
a  most  interesting  and  racy  character,  with 
a  great  deal  of  human  nature  in  it,  a  genial 
bonhomie,  a  bright  wit,  a  love  of  society,  es- 
pecially that  of  cultivated  ladies ;  a  taste 
and  talent  for  diplomacy  of  the  sort  that  ap- 
proaches intrigue  ;  and  an  unaffected  ardor 
of  mystical  devotion  combining  and  co-oper- 
ating with  a  practical  shrewdness  which 
made  him  a  capital  adviser  of  the  pious  but 
sentimental  ladies  who  were  his  favorite 
correspondents,  but  which  proved  a  danger- 
ous gift  to  a  man  who  had  been  taught  by 
one  of  the  most  eminent  Jesuits  f  connected 

*  See  that  tremendous  piece  of  pulpit  eloquence,  the 
Oration  of  Bottini,  Consistorial  Advocate,  at  the  canoni- 
zation of  Francis,  transcribed  in  full  by  Father  Morel. 

t  Father  Possevin,  author  of  the  Soldat  Chretien. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 


with  the  affair  of  St.  Bartholomew's  Day,  to 
make  an  unscrupulous  use  of  it  for  the 
greater  glory  of  God. 

It  is  no  wonder  that  a  mind  constituted 
like  that  of  Francis  should  give  early  evi- 
dence of  a  vocation  to  the  ecclesiastical  ca- 
reer. It  is  not  difficult  to  believe  the  story 
told  of  him  that  when  other  children  were 
playing  soldiers,  he  would  be  playing  church, 
and  leading  about  the  little  peasants  in  a 
procession  instead  of  a  battalion ;  nor  that 
when  he  returned  to  his  father's  castle  at 
Thorens  in  Savoy,  from  his  costly  education 
at  Paris  and  Padua,  an  accomplished  and 
brilliant  young  man  of  twenty-five,  he  should 
already  have  set  before  himself  the  position 
of  Bishop  and  Prince  of  Geneva*  as  a  more 
congenial  one  than  any  he  would  be  likely 
to  attain  in  the  profession  of  arms,  or  in  the 
career  which  his  father's  ambition  had 
marked  out  for  him,  of  country  gentleman 
and  senator  of  Savoy. 

The  story  of  the  disappointment  of  the 
father's  plans  is  told  by  the  most  volumi- 
nous and  authoritative  of  the  saint's  biog- 
raphers, the  Abbe  Marsollier,  with  a  naivete 
characteristic  of  that  class  of  writers.  Soon 
after  Francis'  return  home,  his  father  an- 
nounced that  he  had  arranged  a  marriage 

*  So  the  Abb6  Marsollier,  Vie  de  St.  Frangois,  livre  1. 


6  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

for  him  with  a  charming  young  heiress  in 
the  neighborhood,  daughter  to  the  Baron 
de  Vegy.  "  It  struck  the  young  count  like 
a  thunderbolt,"  says  the  biographer,  who 
has  been  dwelling  with  delight  on  the  early 
vows  of  celibacy  which  the  young  student 
had  made  in  his  private  devotions  ;  and  yet 
not  so  much  like  a  thunderbolt  after  all, 
but  that  he  was  quite  willing  to  ride  over 
to  castle  Vegy  and  take  a  look  at  the  young 
lady.  In  fact,  a  sense  of  respect  for  his 
father's  wishes,  or  something,  led  him  to 
call  often  on  Mile,  de  Vegy,  until  her  feel- 
ings, at  least,  had  become  very  tenderly  en- 
gaged. ' '  This  young  lady  "  (we  quote  from 
the  biography  of  Loyau  d'Amboise)  "no 
longer  concealed  from  him  how  dear  he  had 
become  to  her.  She  never  looked  on  him 
without  an  indefinable  smile  that  bespoke 
the  feelings  of  her  soul.  Not  more  soft 
were  Rachel's  sighs  for  Jacob,  not  more  ten- 
der the  looks  with  which  she  greeted  his 
return  to  the  roof  of  Laban  after  charm- 
ing away  the  fatigues  of  the  day  with 
thoughts  of  her."  To  the  great  satisfac- 
tion of  both  families,  the  affair  was  looked 
upon  as  settled.  Mutual  congratulations 
were  exchanged,  and  in  the  chateau  de 
Sales  they  began  to  choose  the  place  for  the 
bride's  portrait,  and  to  talk  about  the  ar- 


TWO   SIDES  TO  A   SAINT. 


rangements  for  the  wedding  party.  But 
either  the  young  count  had  changed  his 
mind  in  the  course  of  the  wooing,  or,  as  his 
biographers  proudly  assert,  he  never  had  had 
the  slightest  intention  of  marrying  the  girl 
at  all.  At  all  events,  while  this  billing  and 
cooing  was  going  on,  the  young  saint  was 
in  consultation  with  his  cousin  Louis,  canon 
of  the  chapter  of  Geneva,  to  get  him  neatly 
out  of  the  affair,  which  was  managed  by 
securing  for  him  from  the  Pope  the  most 
brilliant  ecclesiastical  appointment  in  the 
diocese,  that  of  provost  of  the  cathedral, 
that  had  just  fallen  vacant.  Not  till  the  docu- 
ment that  secured  him  this  prize  was  fairly 
in  his  hand  did  Francis  take  any  step  that 
could  compromise  his  hopeful  relations  with 
Mile,  de  Vegy.  The  disappointment,  mortifi- 
cation and  shame  of  his  parents,  when  he 
came  to  them  in  company  with  his  cousin, 
the  canon,  showing  the  brief  of  nomination, 
and  announcing  his  intention  to  accept  it, 
are  described  with  exultation  by  his  pane- 
gyrists. His  mother,  with  her  woman's 
heart,  pleaded  tenderly  for  the  forsaken 
girl.  ''Think,"  she  said,  "of  her  distress 
when  she  finds  that  you  have  jilted  her, 
and  that  she  is  repelled  by  the  heart  that 
should  have  been  her  refuge  and  her  love. 
Bitter  will  be  her  tears,  for  she  has  given 


8  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 


you  her  heart  without  the  slightest  mis- 
trust." There  was  nothing  to  be  alleged 
in  answer  to  this  appeal  but  his  vow  and 
his  vocation,  reinforced  by  certain  miracu- 
lous indications  of  duty  that  were  conclusive 
to  his  own  conscience,  but  which,  in  the 
crude  judgment  of  a  man  of  the  world,  it 
Avould  have  been  better  to  have  forgotten 
altogether  than  to  have  recollected  only  at 
that  stage  of  the  affair.  His  mother,  who 
seems  to  have  a  very  clear  view  of  the 
matter,  merely  answered:  "This  vow  of 
yours  was  a  very  fine  impulse;  but  you  know 
just  as  well  as  I  do  that  you  could  be  re- 
leased from  it  by  a  single  word  of  the  Bishop 
of  Geneva."* 

This  incident  in  the  life  of  Francis  has 
no  adequate  justice  done  to  it  in  the  English 
biographies;  but  by  the  Abbe  Marsollier  and 
by  Loyau  d'Amboise  it  is  detailed  as  a  heroic 
instance  of  sacrifice  for  conscience'  sake. 
In  reading  it,  however,  one  can  hardly  re- 
sist the  thought  how  near  the  young  saint 
might  have  been,  at  the  time,  to  a  prema- 
ture martyrdom  to  his  principles  ;  that  if 
Mile,  de  Vegy  had  happened  to  have  a  big 
brother,  the  bodily  sufferings  of  Francis  for 

*  See  the  Lives  of  the  Saint  by  the  two  authors  cited. 
The  complacency  with  which  they  tell  the  story  so  as  to 
show  all  the  essential  facts,  and  yet  without  a  suspicion 
that  there  is  anything  but  heroism  in  their  hero's  course, 
is  wonderful. 


TWO  SIDES  TO   A   SAINT.  9 


his  devotion  to  the  Church  might  have 
begun  before  he  had  so  much  as  entered  on 
his  apostolic  work  among  the  fierce  Protes- 
tants of  the  Chablais. 

It  is  no  more  than  justice  to  the  memory 
of  the  saint  to  say  that  this  seems  to  have 
been  the  most  serious  of  the  indiscretions 
into  which  he  fell  in  his  relations  with  the 
fair  sex.  The  excessive  protestations,  on 
the  part  of  himself  and  his  clerical  eulo- 
gists, of  a  very  exceptional  virtue  in  this 
regard,  and  his  too  frequent  occasions  for 
hand-to-hand  encounter  with  temptation, 
such  as  do  not  usually  occur  to  honest  gen- 
tlemen who  keep  temptation  at  a  proper 
distance,  suggest  suspicions  for  which  there 
is  no  corroboration.  He  was  eminently  a 
ladies'  man,  "  for  ever  surrounded  by 
women;"*  and  he  was  evidently  disposed  by 
nature  to  a  sort  of  coquetry,  against  which 
he  doubtless  strove  to  guard  himself.  The 
mild  terms  of  almost  playful  rebuke  with 
which  he  answers  letters  of  amorous  adula- 
tion are  in  bad  taste  ;  but  bad  taste  is  not  al- 
ways sinful,  whatever  Mr.  Ruskin  may  say. 
The  bishop  writes,  for  instance,  in  1618,  to 
one  of  these  enthusiastic  adorers:  "Dear- 
est girl  of  my  heart,  I  want  to  tell  you  that 
J  have  a  child  who  writes  to  me  that,  being 

*Spiritof  St.  Francis,  III.,  1,  §  24,  Ed.  Riviugtons. 


10  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 


separated  from  me  has  thrown  her  into  dis- 
tress; that  if  she  did  not  restrain  her  eyes 
they  would  shed  tears  over  my  departure, 
asthe  sky  sheds  rain,  and  other  fine  things  of 
the  sort.  But  she  goes  beyond  this,  and 
says  that  I  am  not  a  mere  man,  but  some 
divinity  sent  on  earth  to  compel  us  to  love 
and  admire  him;  and  she  even  adds  that  she 
would  use  still  stronger  language  if  she 
dared.  Now,  my  child,  what  do  you  think 
of  that  ?  Isn't  it  very  naughty  to  talk  so  ? 
Isn't  it  extravagant  language  ?  "*  etc.  Let 
him  that  is  without  sin  rebuke  the  genial, 
warm-hearted  bachelor  bishop  for  not  drop- 
ping that  sort  of  letter  into  the  fire  un- 
answered, or  for  not  answering  it  sharply. 
Our  censure,  if  we  should  venture  upon  any, 
would  be  reserved  for  the  editor  who,  in 
culling  from  the  voluminous  masses  of  the 
saint's  correspondence,  materials  for  a  Com- 
plete Religious  Letter-writer  for  English 
clergymen  and  their  fair  parishioners, 
should,  out  of  so  much  that  is  admirable, 
have  selected  this  one.  It  is  withal  an  in- 
justice to  the  character  of  Francis,  who,  in 
very  trying  circumstances,  proved  himself, 
we  honestly  think,  as  pure  as  the  average  of 
Protestant  ministers — and  that  is  high  praise. 

*  Lettre  h  une  dame,  du  22  avril,   161 8.      P.  82  of  the 
volume  of  Messrs.  Rivingtons.  Ed.  Blaise,  418. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A   SAINT.  11 


Of  course  no  one  will  justify  everything  in 
his  affair  with  Mme.  de  Chantal.  We  will 
not  deny  that  a  miraculous  revelation  from 
heaven*  may  justify,  in  extreme  cases,  a 
fascinating  clergyman  of  thirty-seven  in  cul- 
tivating a  platonico  religious  intimacy  with 
an  extraordinarily  beautiful  widow  of  thirty- 
two.  But  no  case  could  justify  the  parties 
in  clandestine  correspondence  such  as  took 
place  at  the  outset  of  this  aquaintance.  It 
was  June  14,  1604,  that  Francis  wrote  to 
the  Baroness  de  Chantal  :  " Since  your 
father-director  permits  you  to  write  me 
sometimes,  I  beg  you  will  do  so  freely  and 
heartily.  It  will  be  an  act  of  charity.  My 
present  circumstances  and  occupation  make 
me  an  object  of  compassion.  To  hear  from 
persons  like  you  refreshes  me  like  dew. 
The  length  of  this  letter  shows  you  how  my 
mind  relishes  intercourse  with  yours,  "f 
This  letter  was  intended  to  be  shown  freely 
to  her  father  and  to  her  confessor,  and  con- 
tained expressions  highly  gratifying  to  their 
feelings.  Ten  days  later  it  was  followed  by 
a  strictly  confidential  letter,  tending  to  sup- 
plant the  influence  of  both  these  gentlemen 
by  his   own.     "  My   last   letter/'   he   says, 


*  Francis  himself  makes  no   pretence  of  the  heavenly 
vision. 

t  Letter  of  June  14,  1604.    No.  58. 


12  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

"will  help  you  to  quiet  the  mind  of  the 
good  father  to  whom  you  ask  leave  to  show 
it.  I  stuffed  it  well  with  things  calculated 
to  forestall  any  suspicion  on  his  part  that  it 
was  written  with  design;"  and  he  goes  on 
to  urge  her  by  the  example  of  St.  Teresa, 
not  to  limit  her  confidences  to  her  confessor, 
but  to  accept  him,  Francis,  in  a  more  in- 
timate and  spiritual  relation.*  We  really 
believe  that  much  good  came  of  this  friend- 
ship with  Mme.  Chantal,  especially  as  the 
parties  grew  older;  and  that  no  serious  harm 
came  of  it,  beyond  some  temporary  distress 
in  the  family  of  President  Fremiot,  a  revolt- 
ing and  fatal  "marriage  of  convenience/' 
and  a  certain  amount  of  duplicity,  and  of 
unwholesome  excitement  in  both  the  bishop 
and  the  baroness  growing  out  of  their  un- 
natural relation.  The  affair  turned  out 
much  better  than  it  began.  If  any  docu- 
ment nearly  as  scandalous  as  the  letter  above 
quoted  had  been  produced  in  a  recent  cause 
celebre  in  which  the  character  of  one  of  the 
most  famous  of  modern  preachers  was.  at 
issue,  it  would  have  gone  hard  with  him 
before  the  jury.  We  will  not  say  more  than 
that  our  saint  was  indiscreet;  but  it  is  im- 
possible to  say  less  :  and  the  disposition  to 

*  Letter  59. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  13 


dodges  and  intrigues  illustrated  by  this  in- 
cident throws  a  light  on  other  portions  of 
his  history  which  it  would  not  be  honest  to 
refuse  to  accept. 

The  character  in  which  Francis  has  had 
least  justice  done  him  by  the  publications 
commonly  current   is  that  of   Missionary. 
His  greatest  achievement,  the  conversion  of 
the  Chablais,  is  related  copiously  and  effu- 
sively by  Lady  Herbert  and  more  briefly  by 
the  author  of  A  Dominican  Artist.     But 
the  substance  of  the  story,  as  they  tell  it, 
may  be  condensed  into  a  few  words.     Be- 
ing sent  as  a  young  man  to  destroy  by  his 
preaching  the  Protestant  heresy  that  had 
become  rooted  in  the  province  of  the  Chab- 
lais,  he  devoted  himself  to  this  task,  in  the 
face  of  excessive  dangers  and  hardships,  re- 
fusing military  aid  and  protection,  for  the 
space  of  four  years.     The  force  of  his  argu- 
ments, the  persuasiveness  of  his  eloquence, 
the  meekness  and  gentleness  of  his  life,  the 
sweetness  of   his  disposition,   his  forgiving 
love  towards  his  enemies,  and  the  miracles 
that  were  wrought  by  him,  overcame  the 
bitter  prejudices   of   the   Protestants,  who 
came  to  him  in  thousands  to  abjure  their 
errors,  until,  by  the  influence  of  his  minis- 
try, the  whole  population  of  the  province 


14  TWO   SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

was  won  to  the  Church,  and  heresy  com- 
pletely extirpated.* 

Thus  runs  the  story;  but  the  biographies 
of  the  saint,  even  in  the  mitigated  form  in 
which  they  are  delivered  to  the  British 
public,  enrich  this  outline  with  magnificent 
colors.  We  are  led  by  them  through  a  be- 
wildering haze  of  fictions  and  exaggerations. 
The  project  of  canonizing  Francis  was  en- 
tertained even  before  his  death,  and  the 
work  of  procuring  proofs  of  his  sanctity  was 
diligently  begun  by  his  influential  family. 
The  miracles  of  the  saint  are  boldly  com- 
pared to  those  of  the  Saviour  of  mankind, 
and  under  the  one  head  of  the  raising  of 
the  dead  are  declared  to  be  fully  equal  to 
those  of  the  divine  model,  f  But  the  won- 
ders wrought  by  Francis  himself  are  far 
below  those  effected  by  the  imagination  of 
his  eulogists.  Not  only  do  they  multiply 
the  population  of  the  province  tenfold,  but 


*  The  most  condensed  summary  of  the  fictitious  legend 
of  Francis  de  Sales  is  perhaps  the  Bull  of  Canonization, 
which  may  be  found  in  the  Appendix  of  the  Life  by  Loyau 
d'Amboise. 

t  The  original  Life  of  Francis,  published  by  his  nephew 
Auguste,  about  ten  years  after  the  apostle's  death,  con- 
cludes thus,  with  almost  inconceivable  bad  taste  :  "  It  is 
that  son  and  nephew  that  Francis  loved  that  testifieth  of 
these  things,  and  he  knoweth  that  his  witness  is  true. 
And  many  other  things  did  Francis  de  Sales,  which  are 
not  written  in  this  book,  which,  if  they  were  written,  I 
believe  that  the  world  would  not  contain  them."  But  it 
is  a  notable  fact  that  with  the  single  exception  of  the 
casting  out  of  devils,  not  one  of  these  miracles  is  men- 
tioned or  alluded  to  by  Francis  himself. 


TWO   SIDES   TO   A   SAINT.  15 


they  change  the  face  of  nature  and  create 
new  heavens  and  a  new  earth  for  the  scene 
of  their   hero's  exploits.      The   charming 
plain  on  the  southern  shore  of  Lake  Leman, 
fenced   from   harsh   winds  by  magnificent 
walls  of  mountain,  where  fig  trees  grow  in 
the  open  gardens,  and  the  gravest  of  the 
winter  hardships  is  the  rarity  of  a  week's 
skating,    becomes   an   awful  wilderness   in 
which    "eternal  winter"  reigns,    such   as 
Salvator  Eosa   loved  to  paint.     The  quiet, 
good-humored  peasants  a  re  transformed  into 
fierce  assassins,  ambushed  in  every  hedge  ; 
and  the  stalwart  young  apostle,  "  one  of  the 
best  built  men  of  his  time,"  flush  of  money 
and  resources  of  every  kind,  backed  by  the 
treasury  and  army  of  Savoy,  and  perhaps 
the    best    protected    man    in    Europe,    is 
changed  into  a  suffering  martyr,  confront- 
ing daily   deaths  with  heroic  resignation, 
and  answering  the  warnings  and  entreaties 
of  his  friends  with  a  calm,  patient  smile. 
Everything    becomes   heroic.      For   better 
security,  he  takes  his  lodging  at  the  castle 
of  Allinges,  on  a  pretty  knoll  of  rock  com- 
manding a  delicious  landscape,  where  he  is 
the  petted  guest  of  the  commandant;  and  we 
are  invited  to  admire  the  fortitude  of  this 
stout,  active  young  fellow  of  twenty-seven 
in  that  he  actually  takes  the  hour's  walk 


16  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

into  town  on  foot.  *  He  has  chilblains,  and  we 
hear  (in  the  panegyrics)  the  gurgling  of  the 
blood  as  it  gushes  through  his  stockings  and 
gaiters  and  stains  his  footprints  in  the  snow. 
A  bridge  being  broken,  he  crosses  the 
stream  on  a  plank;  and  his  biographers 
roll  their  pious  eyes  and  lift  up  adoring 
hands  in  admiration  of  the  miracle.  Later 
in  his  career,  when  as  bishop  he  visits  the 
valleys  of  Chamounix  and  Sixt,  his  admirers 
will  not  be  content  unless  we  join  in  their 
wonder  at  the  sublime  courage  and  self- 
denial  with  which  he  adventures  himself  in 
those  dreadful  places  whither  it  is  the  de- 
light of  tourists  from  all  the  lands  of  the 
earth  to  follow  him.f 

When  Francis  de  Sales  entered  on  his 
mission  in  the  Ohablais,  in  September,  1594, 
that  region  had  been  Protestant  for  fifty- 
eight  years.  Thirty  years  before,  in  1564, 
it  had  been  receded  to  Savoy  by  the  Bernese, 
in  the  treaty  of  Nyon,  with  the  stipulation 
that  the  exercise  of  the  Protestant  religion 


*  In  the  Life  by  Loyau  d'Amboise,  the  one  league 
stretches  to  three  "  that  the  fatigue  may  touch  hard 
hearts,1'  p.  70,  72. 

+  Francis  was  a  lover  of  natural  beautj'  (see  Sainte 
Beuve,  Port  Royal,  I,  218)  and  fully  capable  of  enjoying 
the  magnificent  scenery  of  his  diocese.  Mr.  Gaberel,  the 
venerable  historian  of  Geneva,  makes  the  curious  remark 
in  his  work  on  Rousseau  et  les  Genevois,  that  the  earliest 
mention  to  be  found  in  extant  literature  of  the  natural 
beauties  of  the  region  of  the  Leman  is  in  Auguste  de 
Sales'  life  of  his  uncle. 


tWO  SIDES  TO   A  SAINT.  !7 


therein  should  not  only  not  be  molested,  but 
should  be  protected  and  maintained  by  the 
Catholic  sovereign  —  a  stipulation  allowed 
for  the  express  reason  that  the  people  of  the 
ceded  province  were  so  heartily  attached  to 
their  faith  that  it  would  be  impossible  to 
detach  them  from  it  without  great  violence. 
Under  this   treaty  the   Ohablais   abode  in 
peace  and  prosperity  for  sixteen  years,  until 
the  death  of  the  just   and   liberal-minded 
Duke  who  made  the  treaty,  and  the  acces- 
sion of  his  son,  Charles  Emmanuel,  a  prince 
the  depth  of  whose  religious  convictions  is 
indicated  by  his  declaration  that  he  held  it 
to  be  "  the  duty  of  a  good  Christian  to  fight 
the  G-enevese,  all  pledges  and  oaths  to  the 
contrary  notwithstanding."     His  deed  was 
as  good  as  his  word.     Plots  of  treachery  and 
secret  violence  against  the  heretic  city  suc- 
ceeded each  other  so  frequently  that  at  last 
the  magistrates  decided  that  a  state  of  open 
war  was  better  than  such  a  peace ;  and  in 
1589  war  was  declared  by  the  little  town 
against  its  powerful  and  warlike  neighbor — 
a  war  that  horribly  devastated  the  entire 
neighborhood,  and  drained  Geneva  of  blood 
and  treasure,  but  left  it  covered  with  glory 
and  strong  in  religious  faith.     In  the  course 
of  this  war,    Thonon,   the   capital  of  the 
Chablais,    being  attacked  by  the  Genevese 


18  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

with  their  Swiss  and  French  allies,  sur- 
rendered, doubtless  with  small  regret  on  the 
part  of  its  Protestant  population.  When, 
at  the  beginning  of  an  unstable  peace,  in 
1694,  the  treaty  of  Nyon  was  reaffirmed,  the 
Duke  did  not  forget  the  coldness  of  the 
people  of  Thonon  in  the  war  against  their 
fellow-believers,  and  had  not  long  to  wait 
for  an  opportunity  of  revenge. 

That  very  year  the  Duke  resolved  to  con- 
vert the  Chablais.  The  time  was  well 
chosen.  The  people  had  suffered  miserably 
in  the  war,  and  had  little  heart  to  resist 
injustice;  the  Protestant  pastors  had  been 
harried  out  of  the  country,  and  only  three 
or  four  of  them  allowed  to  return;  public 
worship  had  ceased  in  most  of  the  villages, 
and  the  children  were  growing  up  without 
instruction;  little  heroic  Geneva  crouched 
behind  her  walls,  panting  in  utter  exhaus- 
tion ;  and  what  was  more  to  the  purpose, 
Berne,  the  other  party  to  the  treaty  of 
Nyon,  that  had  the  right,  under  its  terms, 
to  insist  on  the  maintenance  of  the  stipula- 
tion in  favor  of  the  Protestant  religion,  had 
shown  very  plainly  that  she  had  no  more 
stomach  for  fighting  on  account  of  others,  so 
that  there  was  little  danger  of  any  hindrance 
growing  out  of  that  document,  unless  it 
were,  peradventure,  some  scruple  of  honor 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  19 


on  the  Duke's  part,  or  some  diplomatic  re- 
monstrance from  Berne. 

Accordingly  the  Duke  sent  a  letter  to  the 

old  Bishop  of  Geneva,  at  Annecy,  asking 

him  to  send  missionaries  into  the  Chablais, 

and  promising  to  aid  them  in  their  work 

with  the  whole  force  of  his  authority,   to 

give  them  commissions  accrediting  them  as 

employed  in  the  ducal  service,  and  to  charge 

all  commandants  of  posts  to  help  the  work 

to  the  utmost  of  their  power.     Perhaps  the 

history   of    Christian    missions    has    never 

offered  an  opening  with  so  many  attractions 

to  an  enterprising  and  devoted  clergyman, 

and  so  few  drawbacks,  as  that  now  presented 

to  the  brilliant  and  active  young  Provost  of 

the  chapter.     Francis  volunteered  at  once, 

and   started   for   his   mission-field   without 

delay,  accompanied  by  his  cousin  Louis,  the 

canon. 

He  had  every  imaginable  advantage  for 
success  in  his  enterprise — young,  handsome, 
ardent  and  enthusiastic,  noble  of  birth, 
bold  and  persevering,  sustained  by  family 
influence  that  gave  him  admission  to  all  the 
best  society  of  the  province,  peculiarly  in- 
sinuating in  the  society  of  ladies,  quick- 
witted, diplomatic  and  adroit,  rarely  losing 
his  temper  in  controversy,  but  maintaining 
the  imperturbable  suavity  of  his  manner 


20  TWO   SIDES  TO   A   SAINT. 


even  when  his  practical  operations  were  of 
the  severest  and  cruellest ;  he  was  at  the 
same  time  a  man  of  strong  convictions — 
strong,  that  is,  with  the  strength  that  comes 
of  an  obstinate  and  conscientious  resolution 
never  to  ponder  an  objection  ;  *  of  graceful 
though  effeminate  eloquence ;  of  intense 
mystical  piety  ;  and  what  proved  in  the  end 
to  be  of  even  greater  importance  to  his 
undertaking — a  versatile  readiness  in  apply- 
ing means  to  ends  without  being  em- 
barrassed by  squeamish  scruples  of  honor 
and  conscience.  Leaving  out  of  considera- 
tion the  alleged  miracles  by  which  his  work 
was  aided,  it  might  almost  be  said  that  if  a 
man  so  gifted  and  so  favored  should  not  be 
successful  in  a  good  cause,  it  would  be  itself 
a  miracle  as  great  as  some  of  those  ascribed 
to  him  in  the  act  of  canonization. 

Naturally,  the  mission  organized  under 
such  auspices  directed  itself  at  once  to  the 
fortress  of  Allinges,  the  headquarters  of 
the  military  governor  of  the  province,  from 
which,  by  means  of  a  powerful  garrison,  he 
held  in  subjection  not  only  the  neighboring 
city  of  Thonon,  but  the  whole  of  the 
harassed  and  wasted  province.  To  him  the 
missionaries  presented  their  letters  from  the 

♦See,  for  a  single  instance,  letter  XI,  p.  57.  Ed.  Riving- 
tons, 


TWO   SIDES    TO   A   SAINT.  21 

Duke  enjoining  him  to  render  them  all  the 
protection  and  support  in  his  power.  The 
governor  was  just  the  man  for  the  occasion. 
A  good  Catholic,  a  zealous  subject,  a  brave 
and  cruel  soldier,  the  Baron  cVHermance 
was  also  a  family  connection  and  an  old 
personal  friend  of  the  Apostle.  A  plan  of 
campaign  was  soon  settled.  They  were  to 
begin  with  the  mildest  measures,  reserving 
the  use  of  violence  as  a  last  resort.*  This 
was  a  course  both  congenial  to  the  feelings 
of  Francis,  and  in  accordance  with  the  ideas 
of  the  Duke,  who  was  not  without  fears  lest 
his  perfidy  should  provoke  the  Bernese  to 
armed  interference.  The  old  soldier  further 
advised  the  missionaries  that  it  would  be  safer 
for  them  to  spend  their  nights  at  the  fort. 
The  people  of  the  Chablais,  so  he  assured 
them,  were  a  good-natured,  simple,  rude 
sort  of  folk,  but  very  obstinate  when  they 
had  made  up  their  minds  ;  they  had  a  very 
bad  opinion  of  the  Roman  Church,  and 
were  convinced  that  their  liberties  and 
privileges  depended  on  their  holding  fast  to 
their  religion — a  notion  that  proved  to  be 
not  far  from  right.  The  next  morning  the 
mission  was  appropriately  inaugurated  by  a 
review   of   the   troops,    and    the   governor, 

*  Marsollier,  livre  II. 


22  TWO   SIDES  TO   A    SAINT. 


pointing  to  his  force  of  artillery,  remarked 
significantly  to  Francis  :  "  If  the  Huguenots 
over  there  will  give  you  a  hearing,  I  hope 
we  shall  have  no  need  to  use  these  guns.'r  * 
Advancing  bravely  from  his  fortified  base, 
Francis  presented  himself  to  the  magistrates 
of  Thonon  with  letters  commanding  them 
to  render  all  possible  services  to  the  mis- 
sionaries, and  to  attend  upon  their  preach- 
ing, and  warning  them  that  any  injury 
offered  to  the  priests  would  be  avenged  on 
the  whole  city  of  Thonon.  The  impression 
thus  made  may  have  been  salutary,  but  the 
mild  and  inoffensive  ways  of  Francis  gave 
little  provocation  to  violence.  The  presence 
of  two  such  commissioners  as  he  and  his 
cousin  naturally  provoked  a  temporary 
agitation  in  the  town,  which,  however,  soon 
subsided,  and  the  mission  went  on  quietly 
but  diligently.  He  was  free  to  use  the  great 
church  of  St.  Hippolyte,  and  there,  day  by 
day,  he  gathered  the  little  handful  of  about 
a  dozen  Catholics,  mostly  strangers,  to  hear 
him  preach.  It  was  natural  to  expect  that 
the  uncommon  attractions  of  the  man  him- 
self, and  the  prodigious  combination  of  in- 
fluences by  which  he  was  backed,  would  at 
least  win  now  and  then  a  straggling  towns- 

*  Thus  the  biographers  generally  ;   but  the  quotation  is 
itigated  by  English  editors.     Cf.  Bull  of  Canonization. 


mit 

§15 


TWO  SIDES  TO   A   SAINT.  23 


man  or  peasant  to  listen  to  the  famous 
preacher.  But  it  was  not  so.  He  bewails 
his  disappointment  in  successive  letters. 
"We  had  hoped  that  some  would  come  to 
hear  us,  either  out  of  curiosity  or  out  of 
some  lingering  love  for  the  old  relig- 
ion.      But  they  have    all    resolved,  with 

mutual    exhortations,    not   to    do   it."* 

"Their   heart    is    hardened.      They    have 
said  to  God  :  We  will  not  serve  thee.     They 
will   not    hear   us,   because   they  will   not 
hear  God."   And  yet  the  governor  had  been 
as  good  as  his  word,  and  used  his  personal 
persuasions  to  induce  persons  to  hear  the 
Apostle.     But  the  result  is  summed  up  by 
Francis    in    these  words:    "I    have   been 
preaching  at  Thonon  now  seven  months  on 
every  holiday,  and  often  in  the  week  besides. 
I  have  never  been  heard  but  by  three  or 
four  of  the  Huguenots,  and  these  only  came 
four  or  five  times  except  secretly."    Having 
utterly  failed  in  drawing  the  people  to  hear 
him,  he  went  down  among  the  people,  and 
taking    his  stand  in  the  public  square  on 
market-days,  attempted  to  catch  their  atten- 
tion whether  they  would  or  no.     This  was 
equally  in  vain.     The  peasants  were  as  ob- 

th"isTn«Sin!id  nf  JpllowjPf .citations  are  from  his  letters  of 
JffiS  i  •  In  oneof  them  Francis  alleges  that  a  mu- 
nicipal law  was  made  forbidding  attendance  on  his  ser- 
ial/Vh,FiUitthlS  1S  VeKy  «nlikely-  ^  the  Ed.  Blaise  (Paris, 
1821)  the  letters  may  be  found  in  chronological  order 


24  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 


durate  as  the  citizens.  In  the  country 
villages  they  refused  not  only  to  hear  him, 
but  even  to  give  him  so  much  as  a  lodging 
on  payment.  At  the  end  of  a  year's  toil, 
wishing  to  draw  together  all  the  results  of 
his  mission,  he  announced  far  and  wide  that 
he  would  preach  on  St.  Stephen's  day  in  a 
church  near  the  Allinges.  The  concourse 
consisted  of  seven  persons.  Up  to  this  time 
Thonon  had  not  furnished  a  single  convert. 
The  father  of  Francis  wrote  to  him  that  all 
the  wisest  and  most  sensible  people  con- 
sidered his  further  persistence  in  the  mission 
as  a  mere  tempting  of  Providence,  and  that 
the  only  way  to  bring  back  such  heretics  to 
the  faith  was  by  the  mouth  of  the  can- 
non. 

Nevertheless,  with  admirable  persistence, 
Francis  resolved  to  keep  at  it  for  another 
year,  concentrating  all  his  efforts  on  the 
town  of  Thonon.  Already  he  had  made  use 
of  the  press  to  circulate  his  doctrines  in 
little  tracts  and  broadsides.  He  now  de- 
voted himself  to  discussions,  private  and 
public,  and  to  the  preparation  of  a  book  in 
exposition  of  Catholic  doctrine.  The  aim  of 
his  teaching,  both  oral  and  printed,  was 
characteristic  of  the  man.  It  was  concili- 
atory, dwelling  on  the  points  of  resemblance 
between  the  two  Churches,  rather  than  on 


TWO  SIDES   TO   A  SAINT.  25 

the  points  of  difference,  and  seeking  to  pro- 
duce the  impression  that  the  change  from 
Protestant  to  Catholic,  which  would  be  at- 
tended by  such  vast  worldly  advantages,  was 
not  so  difficult  a  matter  as  some  were  dis- 
posed to  think.  It  was  charged  against  him 
by  some  of  his  own  brethren  that  he  was  not 
honest  in  this  matter  ;  and  it  is  either  very 
fortunate  or  very  unfortunate  for  his  reputa  • 
tion  as  a  Catholic  saint  and  doctor,  that  the 
book  that  would  have  settled  the  question — 
the  book  above  mentioned — should  com- 
pletely and  mysteriously  have  disappeared 
from  the  face  of  the  earth.* 

Finding  townsfolk  and  peasantry  as  stead- 
fast as  ever  in  their  faith,  Francis  turned 
to  the  provincial  gentry.  Helplessly  de- 
pendent as  these  were  on  the  duke's  favor 
for  promotion,  whether  in  a  military  or  in 
a  civil  career,  it  was  not  difficult  to  bring- 
strong  motives  to  bear  upon  them  to  per- 
suade them  to  give  a  hearing  to  the  message 
of  salvation.  Among  them,  the  Baron 
d'Avully,  a  man  of  great  influence,  was  the 
husband  of  a  zealous  Catholic  lady,  a  de- 
voted admirer  of  Francis.  Her  "prayers 
and  tears,"  combined  with  the  arguments 
of  the  missionary,  made  a   deep  impression 

*This  is  all  the  more  remarkable,  since  with  the  excep- 
tion of  this  important  work,  every  scrap  of  Francis'  writ- 
ing has  been  so  religiously  preserved. 


28  TWO   SIDES  TO   A  SAINT. 

on  this  gentleman  ;  but  before  announcing 
his  conversion  he  asked  to  hear  a  discussion 
of  the  points  at  issue.  A  meeting  was  ar- 
ranged between  Francis  and  Pastor  La  Faye 
of  Geneva,  at  which  the  discussion  lasted 
three  hours.  The  affair  being  reported  only 
by  friends  of  Francis,  it  is  needless  to  say 
that  the  wretched  Protestant  was  over- 
whelmed with  argument  at  all  points ; 
"  frantic  with  rage,  he  broke  out  in  a  tor- 
rent of  insulting  language."  It  is  again  un- 
fortunate that  we  have  no  report  of  the 
language  used  ;  but  the  papers  of  a  subse- 
quent discussion  between  the  same  parties 
are  to  be  seen  in  the  Library  of  Geneva,  and 
afford  us  some  ground  of  conjecture.  To 
his  antagonist's  argument  our  saint  meekly 
replies  :  "  Your  book  is  utterly  worthless. 
It  is  packed  with  absurdities,  lies,  and  blas- 
phemies. It  is  the  work  of  a  poor,  arrogant, 
broken-winded  minister,  who  has  gone 
crazy  with  passion  and  rage ;  a  fool- 
hardy, blind,  impudent  impostor,  a  char- 
latan, a  Proteus,  a  chameleon,  an  exces- 
sively ignorant  ex-monk  and  ex-priest/' 
In  answer  to  these  gentle  words,  the 
heretic  bursts  forth  with  his  furious  in- 
solence as  follows  :  "I  am  not  a  Proteus  nor 
a  chameleon  ever  since  I  have  known  God's 
truth  I  have  steadfastly  followed  it.     It  is  a 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  21 


small  matter  to  be  judged  of  man's  judg- 
ment. We  must  stand  or  fall  to  our  own 
Master,  to  whom  all  our  service  is  due.  The 
Christian's  fairest  ornament  is  a  humble 
mind.  Let  him  that  thinketh  himself  wise 
take  heed  lest  he  fall."  If  the  above  is  an 
accurate  report,  it  is  truly  painful  to  see  how 
far  the  tender,  gentle  nature  of  the  saint  had 
changed  places  with  such  a  rude  creature  as 
this  Geneva  pastor.* 

Besides  d'Avully,  there  was  converted  a 
noted  lawyer  named  Poncet.     Of  these  ac- 
cessions the  utmost  was  made.  D'Avully  was 
honored  with  a  brief  from  the  pope's  own 
hand,  couched  in  the  most  flattering  terms, 
and   assuring   the   neophyte  of  the  distin- 
guished favors  of  the  duke.     But  the  hopes 
inspired  by  these  two  successes  were  disap- 
pointed.    At  the  end  of   the  second  year's 
toil,  the  list  of  converts  amounted  to   just 
twelve, f  and  the  disgusted   apostle  declares 
to  the  duke:  "  Your  Ohablais  is  a   ruined 
province.  Here  have  I  been  laboring  twenty- 
seven  months  in  this  miserable  country;  but 
I  have  sown  among  thorns  or  in  stony  places. 

*The  citations  are  from  Gaberel,  Hist,  de  VEglise  de 
Geneve,  II.,  596  But  the  later  editions  of  Francis1  works 
are  expurgated  of  insulting  words  and  adapted  to  the 
modern  taste.    Ibid.  642. 

+  The  list  of  them  is  given  in  the  ori-inal  Life  by 
Auguste  de  Sales;  but  according  to  the  current  biogra- 
phies the  converts  in  Thonon  alone  were  lorn?  before  thi» 
to  be  counted  by  hundreds.  See,  for  example,  Loyau 
d'Amboise,  p.  88.  J 


28  TWO  SIDES  TO  A   SAINT. 


Certainly,  except  M.  d' Avidly,  and  Poncet 
the  lawyer,  the  rest  of  the  converts  are  not 
much  to  talk  of.  I  pray  God  for  better  luck ; 
and  I  am  sure  that  your  highness's  piety  will 
not  permit  all  our  efforts  to  be  in  vain."  * 

For  many  months  it   had  been  growing 
plain  to  Francis  and  his  friends  that  meas- 
ures of  a  more  vigorous  s  >rt  must  be  used 
if  anything  was  to  be  accomplished.     This 
is  .the  point  of  his  appeal  to  the  duke's  piety. 
A  year  before,  his  friend  President  Favre  had 
condoled  with  him   on   the   inefficient  sup- 
port he  received  from  the  authorities  ;  and 
the   apostle    himself    had    complained    to 
the  Jesuit  Oanisius  that  "  His  Serene  High- 
ness would  not  use  violence  to  bring  these 
people  back  into  the  Church,  on  account  of 
the  treaty  on  that  point  with  Berne."     But 
on   December  29,  1595,  he  applies   to  the 
duke  to  have  President  Favre  sent  with  a 
commission  to  compel  the  citizens  to  attend 
his  preaching.       "This   gentle   violence," 
said  he,  "will  I  think  constrain  them  to  ac- 
cept the  yoke  of  our  holy  zeal,  and  make  a 
great  breach  in  their  obstinacy."  f 

*Discours  au  Due  de  Savoie  le  9  decembre  1596.  CEuvres 
de  St  Frangois  de  Sales.  Ed.  Blaise,  vol.  XIV.  Opuscules, 
p.  75. 

+  To  this  earlier  period  of  the  mission  belong  the  stories 
of  attempted  assassination  from  which  the  saint  escapes, 
sometimes  by  miracle  and  sometimes  by  "sweetness, 
but  always  magnificently  scorning  the  protection  of  the 
secular  arm.    There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  they 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  29 

So  absolute  was  the  necessity,  that,  not- 
withstanding the  unfavorable  season,  he 
crossed  the  Alps  in  November,  159G,  for  a 
personal  interview  with  the  duke  at  Turin. 
The  new  program  for  the  conversion  of  the 
Chablais  which  he  submitted  to  the  duke  in 
council,  is  reported  by  Lady  Herbert  with 
great  '"sweetness"  as  consisting  chiefly  in 
"three  things  :  the  re-establishment  of  the 
mass  at  Thonon  ;  the  restoration  of  the 
property  belonging  to  the  Church  ;  and  the 
appointment  of  a  certain  number  of  priests 
and  teachers,  at  fixed  revenues  throughout 
the  province.  He  also  urged  the  establish- 
ment of  seminaries  and  schools  ;  the  pro- 
hibition of  heretical  and  atheistical  publica- 
tions ;  and  the  foundation  of  a  House  of 
Mercy  at  Thonon."  *  Some  trifling  matters 
besides  are  contained  in  the  memorandum  of 
Francis,  which  have  escaped  her  ladyship's 


are  all  falsehoods.  Francis  never  alludes  to  them.  His 
parents  at  home  did  doubtless  fidget  about  the  safety  of 
their  favorite  son.  But  a  letter  to  him  from  his  friend, 
President  Favre.  says  :  "  My  only  trouble  is  that  your 
good  father  worries  so  for  fear  some  harm  will  come  to 
you,  that  I  can  hardly  persuade  him  that  you  are  perfect- 
ly safe,  and  that,  as  I  believe,  there  is  not  the  slightest  oc- 
casion to  suspect  danger  for  you.  I  comfort  him  all  I  can, 
often  protesting  (what  I  am  sure  you  do  not  doubt)  that 
I  never  would  have  left  you  if  I  could  have  perceived  ihe 
slightest  danger  to  be  feared."  After  Francis1  death 
these  assassination  stories  had  a  double  value,  as  con- 
tributing to  the  materials  of  canonization,  and  as  black- 
ening the  character  of  the  Protestants. 

*  The  Mission  in  the  Chablais,  p.  84. 


30  TWO   SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

attention,  but  which  we  add  as  an  illustra- 
tion of  the  saint's  business-like  ways  : 

"The  minister  of  Thonon  to  be  sent  away  to 
some  place  where  he  can  have  no  intercourse 
with  his  people. 

The  heretic  schoolmaster  to  be  removed  and 
a  Catholic  put  in  his  place  until  the  Jesuits  can 
be  settled. 

Liberalities  to  be  shown  towards  some  seven 
or  eight  old  persons  who  have  remained  Cath- 
olic. 

Heretics,  within  a  brief  time,  must    be  de 
prived  of  all  public  offices,  and  Catholics    ap- 
pointed into  their  places. 

Good  promotion  iu  the  army  for  Catholic 
young  men. 

One  of  the  senators  to  summon  all  the  citi- 
zens of  Thonon  to  turn  Catholic. 

All  Protestant  books  to  be  burned. 

Your  highness  to  show  liberality  to  the  new 
converts. 

It  is  necessary  to  scatter  terror  through  the 
whole  population  by  wholesome  edicts."* 

The  Council  shrank  from  a  policy  at  once 


*  See  the  copy  of  the  original  memorandum  ia  Etudes 
biographiques  sur  St.  Frangois,  Chambery,  1860.  This 
work,  although  published  anonymously,  is  valuable  and 
accurate.  There  is  also  a  scholar-like  and  conscientious 
thesis  by  Pastor  Guillot  of  the  Geneva  Church,  entitled 
Francois  de  Sales  et  les  Protestants,  Geneve,  1873.  The 
two  chapters  on  Francis  de  Sales  in  M.  Gaberel's  Hist oire 
deVEglise  le  Geneve,  vol.  II,  have  been  violently  attacked 
in  a  pam  hlet  by  the  AbbeFleury  (magni  now inis  umbra), 
entitled  St.  Francois  de  Sales,  li  P.  Cherub  in  et  les  min- 
istres  de  Geneve,  Paris,  1861.  The  writer  clearly  convicts 
his  antagonist  of  some  loose  quotations,  but  leaves  him 
safe  in  his  main  positions.  These  various  documents  will 
guide  the  student  to  the   original  sources  of  information. 


TWO   SIDES   TO  A  SAINT.  31 


so  audacious  and  so  perfidious.  But  "  with 
his  usual  sweetness  "  (as  the  Abbe  Marsollier 
admiringly  puts  it)  the  ardent  young  saint 
represented  that  the  other  party  to  the 
treaty  was  in  no  condition  to  enforce  his 
rights  ;  that  the  conversion  was  of  great 
political  importance  ;  that  he  would  not 
recommend  using  violence  at  all  ;  but  that 
"  if  the  Council  thought  they  were  going  to 
re-establish  Catholicism  in  the  Chablais  with 
only  such  means  as  had  been  used  hitherto, 
they  were  very  much  mistaken." 

The  Council  were  not  convinced.  Per- 
haps, indeed,  the  clergyman  had  failed  to 
seethe  point  of  their  scruples.  But  the 
duke,  whoso  conscience  was  not  over  nice, 
had  been  won  to  Francis'  policy  in  advance. 
He  cleared  the  Council  Chamber  with  a  sic 
volo,  sic  jubeo,  and  the  saint  returned  to  his 
spiritual  labors  in  triumph. 

The  first  use  which  he  made  of  his  new 
powers  must,  we  fear,  be  described  as  char- 
acteristic. Secretly,  without  communicating 
with  the  authorities  of  the  town,  he  intro- 
duced workmen  into  the  great  church  of  St. 
Hippolyte,  and  commenced  tearing  down 
and  building  to  transform  the  edifice  into  a 
Catholic  church.  This  high-handed  oper- 
ation, begun  without  any  show  of  authority, 
naturally  provoked    an   indignant  tumult. 


82  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

Tiie  magistrates  of  the  town  hastened  to  the 
church,  and  restrained  the  people  from  vio- 
lence ;  then  turning  to  Francis  they  re- 
minded him,  with  dignity,  that  under  the 
treaty  of  Nyon  theirs  was  a  free  city,  and 
that  such  proceedings  as  his  could  not  be 
undertaken  but  with  their  consent.  Not 
until  the  affair  had  reached  this  point  did 
Francis  display  his  new  orders  from  Turin  to 
the  eyes  of  the  astounded  and  humiliated 
magistrates,  with  the  threat  that  if  they  dared 
to  interfere  with  them  it  would  cost  them 
the  utter  destruction  of  the  town.  It  was, 
on  the  whole,  not  a  pretty  trick  for  an 
apostle  to  play  ;  but  it  was  fairly  successful. 
It  failed,  indeed,  to  provoke  a  riot ;  but  it 
succeeded  in  inflicting  a  public  insult  on  the 
municipal  authorities,  and  in  "scattering 
terror  "  through  the  population.  Francis 
wrote  back  to  the  duke  witli  holy  exultation : 
"The  magistrates  opposed  me  stoutly  on 
the  ground  that  it  was  a  violation  of  the 
treaty  of  Nyon.  I  deny  it  ;  but  even  if  it 
were  a  violation  of  the  treaty,  I  do  not  see 
that  it  is  any  of  their  business." 

But  of  what  use  was  a  church  without  a 
congregation  ?  In  order  that  the  Christmas 
high  mass  should  not  be  said  to  empty 
walls,  President  Favre  went  from  village  to 
village    in    the   neighborhood    "scattering 


TWO   SIDES  TO   A   SAINT.  33 


terror '  with  one  hand  and  seductive 
promises  with  the  other.  Under  the  as- 
surance of  being  relieved  from  the  crushing 
taxes,  a  number  of  the  peasants  were  in- 
duced to  attend  the  mass,  and  it  was  cele- 
brated on  Christmas  day  in  the  presence  of 
these,  and  of  the  twelve  Catholics  of  Tho- 


non.* 


From  this  time  forth,  Francis  was  aided 
by  a  great  force  of  Capuchin  friars  and  of 
secular  priests,  who  were  supported  by  the 
salaries  that  had  been  pledged  by  treaty  to 
the  exiled  Protestant  pastors.  But  our 
Apostle  had  lost  faith  in  such  means  of 
evangelization,  and  looked  for  something 
more  effective.  Of  any  ordinary  force  there 
was  no  lack  already  in  the  garrisons  of  the 
Allinges  and  other  military  posts,  which 
were  under  his  orders,  and  which  held  the 
wretched  country  in  complete  subjection,  f 
But  there  was  need  of  something  to  "  scatter 
terror  " ;  and  our  saint  knew  of  just  the  in- 
strument for  the  purpose,  if  only  he  could 

*Gaberel,  II  60-1,  on  the  authority  of  a  manuscript  of 
the  Capuchin  friars  who  aided  Francis.  The  manuscript 
is  curious  and  of  unquestionable  authenticity  ;  and  I  have 
taken  pains  to  verity  the  citation.  St.  Genis  (Histoire  de 
la   Savoie,  II.,  191)  says  that  the    mass  was   celebrated 

before  seven  or  eight  old  persons."  This  writer  show- 
ing no  sympathy  with  the  reformed  religion,  is  neverthe- 
l3ss  compelled  to  study  the  mission  of  Francis  in  its 
political  and  military  aspects  and  comes  to  some  verv 
just  conclusions.  J 

tSee  Bull  of  Canonization,  §  16. 


34  TWO   SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

lay  his  hand  upon  it.  The  Martinengo 
regiment  was  a  name  that  had  only  to 
be  whispered  in  all  that  region  to  make 
the  blood  run  cold  with  horror.  It  was  a 
regiment  of  Spanish  mercenaries  that  had 
been  trained  in  the  American  wars  to  an  ex- 
quisite delight  and  ingenuity  in  human 
torture.  Seven  years  before,  in  the  prov- 
inces neighboring  the  Cbablais,  it  had  been 
let  loose  like  a  ferocious  beast  by  the  Duke 
upon  his  own  unarmed  Protestant  subjects, 
and  day  after  day  had  revelled  in  ingenious 
torture,  murder,  and  destruction.  The 
simple  proch-verbal  containing  the  cata- 
logue of  these  atrocities  is  one  of  the  most 
awful  pages  in  history.  White-haired  old 
men,  the  sick  upon  their  beds,  pregnant 
women,  babies  clinging  to  their  mothers' 
breasts,  were  among  the  favorite  objects  of 
torture.  To  violate,  to  torture,  to  maim,  to 
murder  by  slow  degrees,  were  not  enough ; 
the  bodies  of  the  murdered  must  be  muti- 
lated and  obscenely  exposed.  The  village 
patriarchs  were  hung  in  their  own  chimneys 
to  be  slowly  suffocated  by  the  smoke. 
Others  were  dragged  at  the  heels  of  horses, 
or  roasted  in  burning  barns,  from  which  they 
were  taken  out  gasping  and  thrown  to  die 
on  dunghills.  Meeting  a  3roung  lad,  the 
ruffians  dislocated  all  his  fingers,  then  filled 


TWO   SIDES   TO   A   SAINT.  35 

his  mouth  with  gunpowder  and  blew  his 
head  off.  One  of  their  commonest  ways  of 
inflicting  a  death  of  lingering  anguish  was 
of  a  sort  that  history  refuses  to  describe. 
But  the  following  incident  of  that  brave 
campaign,  from  the  proch-verbalj  suffices 
to  give  an  idea  of  the  style  of  warfare  of  the 
Martinengo  regiment : 

"  The  13th  of  September,  1589,  the  Duke 
of  Savoy  having  the  day  before  entered  the 
province  of  Gex,  his  troops,  passing  through 
Crozet,  took  the  Reverend  Girard  Barbier, 
minister  of  the  Word  of  God  at  the  said 
Crozet,  aged  about  seventy-live  years,  split 
up  the  soles  of  his  feet,  and  set  him  astride 
an  ass,  his  face  towards  the  tail,  and  led  him 
thus,  with  every  kind  of  insult,  and  beating 
him  incessantly,  to  the  Castle  of  Gex,  and 
presented  him  to  the  said  Duke,  in  whose 
presence  he  declared  that  he  had  preached 
nothing  but  the  pure  truth,  and  in  the 
same  would  persevere  until  the  end.  And 
being  brought  away  again,  and  thrown 
upon  a  little  heap  of  straw  in  front  of  his 
house,  he  there  died,  all  his  goods  having 
been  pillaged."* 

Evidently  the  Martinengo  regiment  was 
exactly  what  Francis  needed  for  his  apostolic 

*See  the  document  in  full  in  Gaberel,  II.,  Appendix  235. 
It  fills  eight  pages  of  small  type  with  a  mere  catalogue  of 
horrors. 


36  TWO  SIDES  TO   A  SAINT. 

work.  What  he  wanted  was  not  soldiers, 
but  those  particular  soldiers  ;  and  we  need 
not  say  that  his  application  for  the  use  of 
them  was  not  made  in  vain  to  that  religious 
prince  whom  they  had  entertained  by  their 
playful  treatment  of  the  aged  pastor  of 
Crozet.  At  the  Apostle's  request,  this  horde 
of  devils  were  billeted  on  the  towns  and 
villages  of  the  Chablais.  "Great  was  the 
people's  surprise,"  says  good  Marsollier, 
"when  they  beheld  the  arrival  at  Thonon, 
without  previous  notice,  of  the  regiment  of 
the  Count  of  Martinengo,  lieutenant-gener- 
al of  the  Duke's  armies,  who  took  lodgings 
in  the  town  to  await  orders.  The  officers 
called  in  a  body  on  Francis,  and  informed 
him  that  their  orders  were  to  do  nothing 
except  in  co-operation  with  him." 

From  this  point,  the  work  of  conversion 
was  simple,  straightforward,  and  rapid. 
The  new  missionaries  showed  great  devotion 
to  their  work  of  confiscation  and  banish- 
ment. The  earliest  objects  of  their  evan- 
gelic zeal  were  the  three  or  four  remaining 
pastors.  Louis  Viret,  the  infirm  pastor  of 
Thonon,  took  refuge  across  the  lake,  in  the 
canton  de  Vaud.  His  colleague,  Jean  Olerc, 
was  obliged  to  make  his  escape  from  the 
ruffians  in  haste  with  his  seven  little  chil- 
dren, with  no  other  provision  than  a  piece 


TWO  SIDES   TO   A  SAINT.  37 


of  fifteen  sous.  Pastor  Perraudet  of  Bons, 
quietly  returning  from  a  visit  to  a  sick  man, 
was  overtaken  by  a  trooper,  who  split  his 
skull  with  a  sabre.*  Such  acts  as  this  last, 
it  is  to  be  hoped,  were  rare.  Not  many 
such  could  be  necessary,  and  the  saint  dis- 
liked needless  violence.  All  schoolmasters 
and  other  offensive  characters  were  driven 
into  exile. 

Parallel    with     these     persuasions    were 
others  of  a  kind  more  congenial  to  Francis' 
better  nature.     While  obdurate  Protestants 
were   crushed  with    taxes,   and    saw  their 
houses    devoured,    and     their    wives    and 
daughters    daily   insulted    by  a    billet    of 
ruffianly  troopers,  the  disinterested  candor 
of  those  who  showed  themselves  inclined  to 
the  new  gospel  was  profusely  rewarded  by 
gifts,    promotions,    offices,   festivities,    and 
lavish    hospitalities    at    the    seats    of    the 
Catholic  gentry.     One  noble  house  brought 
itself  to    the   verge   of  ruin  by  its  zealous 
liberality   towards    the    new   converts.      A 
notable  instance  of  the  apostle's  love  to  the 
household  of  faith  was  that  of  the  minister 
Petit,  made  much  of  by  all  the  saint's  bi- 
ographers as  "a  distinguished   Protestant 
clergyman."      The   epithet   does   him   less 
than  justice.     A  dozen  years  before,  lie  had 

*  Guillot,  page  34. 


38  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

been  refused  admission  to  the  Geneva 
parishes  for  his  infamous  character.  Only 
two  years  before,  the  pastors  of  Gex,  believ- 
ing him  penitent,  put  him  in  charge  of  a 
village  church ;  but  at  the  end  of  a  year 
he  was  deposed  from  the  ministry,  and  after- 
wards lodged  in  gaol  at  Geneva,  under  ac- 
cusation of  various  felonies,  and  narrowly 
escaped  the  gallows.  In  short,  he  was  nearly 
as  well  known  as  Martinengo's  troopers. 
Nothing  was  more  natural  than  that  he 
should  have  a  sincere  disgust  for  Protestant- 
ism ;  and  Francis  recognized  without  hesita- 
tion that  he  was  just  the  man  for  his  money, 
and  had  no  scruple  in  writing  to  the  Duke 
that  this  man  could  be  had  for  a  considera- 
tion. "  This  incomparable  prince  "  promptly 
responded  with  an  order  on  the  treasury.* 

But  our  apostle's  burning  thirst  for  souls 
was  not  yet  satisfied.  He  had  the  aid  of  the 
Capuchins,  the  dragoons,  the  nobility,  and 
Petit;  and  legions  of  miraculous  powers  at- 
tended him.  But  nothing  would  content 
him  but  he  must  have  the  Duke  in  person. 
In  the  autumn  of  1598  his  repeated  impor- 
tunities were  fulfilled.  In  company  with 
the  cardinal -legate,  De  Medicis,  the  Duke 
approached  the  town  of  Thonon  with  vin- 
dictive feelings  known  to  all,  and  restrained 

*Gaberel,  II,  612. 


TWO   SIDES   TO   A   SAINT.  Hi) 


only  by  the  frail  bridle  of  his  solemn  word 
and  oath.     The  citizens  and  magistrates  in 
terror  entreated  the  intercession  of  Francis. 
It  was  a  beautiful  opportunity  for  the  dis- 
play of  "his  habitual  sweetness."     He  put 
himself,  with  the  old  bishop,  at  the  head  of 
the    Protestant    magistracy  and  consistory, 
marched  out  to  meet  the  Duke,  and  threw 
himself    at  his  feet,  refusing  to  rise   until 
the  forgiveness  of  the  citizens  was  granted.* 
This  tableau  is  said  to    have  resulted  in  a 
number    of     important    conversions.     But 
touching  as  it  was,  it  did  not  delay  the  saint 
in  getting  to  business.     Some  new  articles 
were  all  ready  which  he  wished  to  have  added 
to  his  program  of  conversion.     ' e  The  heretic 
schoolmasters   had  been  banished;  now,  let 
no  child  be   sent   abroad    to    school.     Let 
heretics  be  expelled  from  all  public  offices, 
not  only  in  his  highness'  immediate  service, 
but  in  subordinate  grades.  Let  Pastor  Viret 
be  kept  as  far  as   possible  from  Thonon. 
Let  all  Catholics  dwelling  in  that  town  be 
admitted  to    the  bourgeoisie.     Finally,   let 
all  exercise  of  the  Protestant  religion  be  ab- 
solutely prohibited."  \     The  Duke  gave  his 
consent,    and  under    date   of  the  12  th   of 

*  Abbe    de  Baudry,    Relation  abregee  des  travaux  de 
VApotre  du  Chablais,  II. 

tGaberel,  II.,  625. 


40  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

October,  patents  were  drawn  by  which 
judges,  advocates,  attorneys,  notaries,  castel- 
lans, and  other  such  functionaries  were  dis- 
missed; and  all  their  acts,  subsequent  to 
that  date,  were  declared  null  and  void;  in 
short,  the  guaranteed  liberties  of  the  Cha- 
blais  were  destroyed  by  the  stroke  of  a  pen.* 
Ambassadors  from  Berne  arrived  soon  after, 
with  a  protest  against  the  perfidy;  and  the 
Duke  submitted  the  matter  to  his  Council, 
which  advised  him  in  favor  of  maintaining 
at  least  the  show  of  good  faith  by  tolerating 
the  presence  of  three  pastors  in  the  prov- 
ince. But  Francis  warned  the  Duke  under 
peril  of  everlasting  damnation  against  any 
such  weak  concession,  f  and  had  his  way 
about  it. 

The  Duke  was  "  amazed  at  the  change 
that  had  passed  over  the  people,  and  all  the 
more  so  as  no  means  had  been  used  to  bring 
them  back  to  the  Church  but  instruction 
and  good  example."  Still,  something  re- 
mained to  be  done.  How  could  this  be, 
when  the  reported  conversions  already  ex- 
ceeded manifold  the  entire  population  of  the 
country,  is  a  materialist  cavil  easily  disposed 
of  in  such  an  epoch  of   miracle.     But   for 

*CEuvres  de  St.  Francis,  XIV.,  91. 
t  Life  of  Francis,  by  Augustus,  179. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  41 


the  hardened  recusants  who  still  held  out 
against  the  sweetness  of  Francis,  severer 
measures  were  now  prepared. 

One  morning  the  gates  of  the  town  were 
occupied  by  soldiers  of  the  Martinengo  regi- 
ment.    A  double  line  of  troops  was  posted 
in  each  of  the  principal  streets,  and  the  en- 
tire bourgeoisie  of  the  town  was  summoned 
to  present  itself    before  the  Duke   in  the 
great  room  of  the  Hotel  de  Ville.     With  a 
shudder,  the  citizens  observed    that  every 
exit  from  the  room  was  guarded  by   these 
Spanish  butchers,*  and  that  at  the   right 
hand  of  the  bloodthirsiy  Duke  sat  his  in- 
spiring genius  in  the  person  of  the  sweetly- 
smiling  Francis  de  Sales.     After  a  harangue 
addressed  to  the  Protestants  by  a  Capuchin 
friar,   the   Duke  himself    addressed  them. 
He  recalled  the  efforts  that  had  been  made 
for    their  conversion,  not  wholly   without 
success.     Those  who  had    been   converted 
would  not  fail  of  bis  royal  favor.     "But," 
said  he,  "there   are  those  who  are  harder 
than  the  millstone;  they  love  their  wallow- 
ing  in  the   mire;   they  prefer  darkness  to 
light.     We  detest  them;  and  if  they  do  not 
turn,    they  shall    know    what  our  disfavor 

£^^^^^^^^ 


42  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

means.  Stand  aside,  wretched  men  !  Let 
those  that  wear  the  Cross  of  Savoy  in  their 
hearts,  and  wish  to  be  of  the  same  religion 
with  their  prince,  stand  here  at  my  right 
hand,  and  those  who  persist  in  their  ob- 
duracy pass  to  my  left  ! " 

There  was  a  moment  of  silence,  a  move- 
ment  in   the   terrified  crowd,    and  several 
went  over  and  took  their  places  at  the  right. 
But  a  large  number  still  remained   at  the 
left.     "  Then  the  blessed  Francis,  leaving 
the  Duke's  side,  came  down  among  these, 
and  exhorted  them  in  the  sweetest  manner, 
saying  :     '  Are  you  not  ashamed  to  act  so  ? 
Have  you  no  eyes  nor  senses  ?     I  warn   you 
to  look  out  for  yourselves,   for  the  Duke 
will    show   you  no   mercy.'     Several  were 
brought  over  by  these  sweet  words.     Then 
the  Duke,  turning    toward   the    obstinate, 
cried  :     '  Depart  from  me  !     You  are  not 
fit  to  live.     In  three  days  begone  from  my 
territories  ! '      The  soldiers  at  once  did  their 
duty,  and  these  wretched  people  went  into 
exile  toward  Nyon  or  Geneva.     There  were 
among  them  gentlemen  of  good  estate,  and 
many  of  less  importance.     Then  his  high- 
ness put  his  patents  into   execution.     The 
mass  was  re-established  in  all  the  churches, 
the   offices  taken  away  from  the  heretics, 
their   books  burned,    and   every   one    who 


TWO   SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  43 


would   not  accept  the  Roman  religion  was 
driven  from  the  country.''  * 

The    "coup  d'etat  of  Thonon  "  was  re- 
peated by  the  same  actors  in  all  the  villages 
of  the  Chablais.     A  later  edict  allowed  six 
months  for  remaining  heretics  to  choose  be- 
tween conversion  and  exile;  and  with  this  we 
may  say  that  "the  Mission  in  the  Chablais" 
was  concluded.     Of  course  for  long  years  to 
come,  the  like  measures  had  to  be  renewed 
in   order   to   prevent   and   punish   relapse. 
Caresses  and  corruption  diminished,  indeed, 
but  cruelty  did  not  cease,  and  of  all  the  pro- 
tracted series  of  confiscations,  banishments, 
and  harryings,    this   smiling    and  seraphic 
creature,  over  whose  inconceivable  meekness 
and   gentleness  such  libations  of    gushing 
eulogy  are  poured  out  by  the  British  press, 
was  the  instigator,  the  director,   and  some- 
times in  his  own  person  the  executioner,  f 

^^^ass^v  ssras  Fate 

of  all  the  subsequent  biographies.  The  incautious  naV JSI 

f^sasasa0"" modified  by  ,ater  -fisss 
tw^»^^s^^r^^^e^  sas 

hastened  ffnSTf "  /'  FranA  "dignant  at  this  ten£rit£ 
hastened  to  the  fortress  of  Allinges  for  an  armed  force 
since  treaties  and  plighted  word°availed  nothS-  "    PBe 
never  appears  to  so  much  advantage  as  when  he  is  vin 
dicating  the  faith  of  treaties.]     "He  obtained   a  detach" 

tTe^use'ofrnd^^  t^^-ht  right  (since  it  concerned 
tne  cause  of  God)  to  put  himself  at  their  head  and  drnvp 
out  by  physical  force  those  whom  he  had Soften  convinced 
by  spiritual  weapons."  The  story  is  toM  by  Fremfn  a 
renegade  Genevese,  who  became  cure  of  Russin  Tn  hit 
mss.  History  of  Geneva,  in  the  Geneva  L^brarvf  p  '.51? 


44  TWO   SIDES  TO   A   SAINT. 

The  work  accomplished  is  variously  es- 
timated, according  to  the  courage  and  im- 
agination of  the  biographer.  Loyau  d'Am- 
boise  puts  it  at  20,000  converts.  The 
Pope  is  very  bold,  and  estimates  Francis' 
total  work  of  conversion  at  70,000.  Lady 
Herbert's  discriminating  pages  give  some 
elements  for  a  conjecture,  as  by  the  20,000 
who  shared  in  the  adoration  at  the  Duke's 
visit  to  Thonon,  and  the  16:4,000  communi- 
cants (it  is  well  to  be  accurate)  present  at 
the  Thonon  Jubilee,  "which  put  the  finish- 
ing stroke  to  the  work  of  conversion  in  the 
Chablais."  The  total  population  of  this 
province,  at  the  beginning  of  the  mission, 
carefully  estimated  from  censuses  taken  be- 
fore and  after,  was  less  than  4000.* 

One  little  incident  closely  connected  with 
the  conversion  of  the  Chablais,  is  too  char- 
acteristic to  be  omitted.  There  was  living 
at  the  time,  in  Geneva,  at  the  age  of  nearly 
eighty  years,  a  most  venerable  man,  the 
latest  survivor  of  the  company  of  the  re- 
formers, Theodore  de  Beza.  The  beauty 
and  dignity  of  his  old  age  charmed  the  great 
Casaubon,  a  few  years  later.  "What  a  man 
he  is  ! "  he  exclaims  ;  "  what  piety  !    What 

*  The  estimate  is  made  by  comparing  the  census  of 
1558  with  that  of  1694,  Gaberel,  II.,  £68.  The  splendid 
figure  of  162,000  is  inclusive  of  pilgrims  who  were  present 
in  large  numbers. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  45 

learning!    To   hear  him  speak   of   eacred 

science,   you  could  not  believe  him  so  ex- 
tremely old.     His  whole  life,  his  whole  talk, 
is  of  God. »     He  too,  like  Francis,  was  of 
noble  birth,  accomplished,  education,  admi- 
rable gifts,  beautiful  courtesy  of  manner, 
and  high  devotion  to  religious  duty.     After 
a  dissipated  youth,  he  had  received,  with  a 
penitence  which  all  his  after  life  attested, 
the  teaching  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  to  the 
unfolding  of  which  his  manhood   was  de- 
voted.    He  left  wealth  and  family  behind 
him,  gave  up  splendid  benefices  that  were 
offered   him   in   the   Roman   Church,   and 
came  to  Geneva,  where  he  became  to  Calvin 
what    Melanchthon   was  to    Luther.      His 
whole  life  had  been  spent  in  stormy  con- 
flicts, but  its  eventide  was  full  of  peace  and 
honors.     By  personal  character,  as  well  as 
by  his  position  as  presiding  pastor  of  the 
Geneva  Church,  he  was  the  foremost  man 
of  the  reformed  communion. 

To  Theodore  de  Beza,  Francis  de  Sales 
was  sent,  during  the  unhopeful  earlier 
months  of  his  Chablais  mission,  with  a  com- 
mission from  the  Pope  to  labor  for  his  con- 
version. Seeking  private  interviews  with 
the  venerable  pastor,  the  enterprising  young 
theologue  plied  him  with  arguments  which 
(it  is  needless  to  say)  were  of  small  effect  on 


46  TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

the  veteran  colloquist  of  Poissy.  Francis 
reported  his  ill-success  to  the  Pope,  and 
asked  for  further  instructions.  The  in- 
structions came  ;  and  this  young  gentleman 
was  not  ashamed  to  go  back  to  the  poor 
study  in  which  the  old  man  toiled  at  his 
daily  work,  with  the  offer,  in  the  name  of 
the  Pope,  of  an  annual  pension  of  4000 
gold  crowns,  and  a  gift  of  twice  the  value 
of  all  his  personal  property,  as  the  price  of 
his  apostasy.  It  is  Francis  himself  that  tells 
the  shameful  story,  and  adds  that,  seeing 
that  he  was  accomplishing  nothing,  he  with- 
drew and  returned  to  Thonon.  A  contem- 
porary manuscript,  preserved  at  Geneva, 
adds  that,  at  these  insulting  words,  old 
Beza's  gentle  expression  changed  to  stern- 
ness. He  pointed  to  his  empty  book-shelves, 
whose  precious  contents  had  been  sold  to 
provide  for  the  suffering  refugees  from 
France,  and,  opening  the  door  for  his  guest, 
let  him  go  with  a  vade  retro,  Sathanas* 

*  Nevertheless,  the  story  that  Beza  was  actually  con- 
vinced and  converted  was  studiously  circulated  at  the 
time  and  is  repeated  to  this  day  in  the  Lives  of  Francis. 
On  the  grave  authority  of  an  after-dinner  story  told  by  a 
pot-companion  of  that  chaste  monarch,  Henry  IV.,  it  is 
alleged  that  the  cause  which  held  this  blameless  old  man 
to  his  principle  s  was  licentiousness  !  One  may  find  the 
charge  and  the  story  gracefully  reproduced  by  Lady 
Herbert,  p.  97.  The  facts  of  the  case,  as  any  well- 
informed  person  might  see,  make  the  charge  simply 
absurd.  But  it  would  be  unjust  to  hold  her  ladyship  to  a 
rigid  moral  responsibility  for  lack  of  information.  Beza 
was  never  under  a  vow  of  celibacy,  so  that  there  was  not 
that  to  bind  him  even  to  the  measure  of  self-denial  exact- 


TWO   SIDES   TO   A   SAINT.  47 


To  get  possession  of  Geneva,  and  to  be 
enthroned  there,  not  only  as  bishop,  but  as 
secular  prince,  was  one  of  Francis'  earliest 
and   latest   dreams.*     To  what  lengths  of 
wrong-doing  he  was  impelled  by  it,  will  not 
be  known  until  the  secrets  of  all  hearts  are 
revealed.     He  is  known   to  us  almost  ex- 
clusively by  the  mendacious  panegyrics  of 
his  friends,   and   by  his  own  copious   but 
not,   ordinarily,  incautious  correspondence. 
Neither  in  these  nor  in  other  documents  do 
we  find  anything  to  convict  him  of  actual 
conscious    complicity    with    the    atrocious 
crime  of  the  Escalade  of  1602 .     What  might 
have  been  if  the  perfidious  projects  which 
the  Duke  was  continually  nursing  in   his 
revengeful  bosom  had  been  rebuked  instead 
of  encouraged  by  his  favorite  clergyman,  we 
can   only  guess.      Perhaps   it   would   have 
made   no  difference  in  the  course  of  that 
wretched  prince  whom  our  saint  publicly 
extols  for  his  piety  and  for  all  the  Christian 

ed  of  the  French  ecclesiastic  of  the  period.  According 
to  this  story,  he  took  refuse,  for  his  vices,  iu  the  one  cor- 
ner of  the  earth  w  here  they  were  sure  to  be  austerely  and 
rigorously  punished  ;  and  refused  wealth  and  asylum  in 
Italy  where  the  state  of  society  and  law  on  this  point  was 
-what  it  was.  It  is  interesting  to  read  the  Bull  in  which 
the  Pope  and  two  score  Italian  prelates  put  their  virtuous 
hands  to  this  disgraceful  libel.  . 

*  Francis  chin-  fast  to  the  title  of  prince  as  well  as 
bishop,  to  the  day  of  his  death;  and  his  will,  the  autograph 
°i  rvX,bich  ls  »nown,  with  other  relics,  at  the  farnhv  seat 
at  rhorens,  gives  instructions  for  his  burial  in  his  own 
cathedral  at  Geneva,  in  case  the  town  should  be  recovered 
to  the  Catholic  religion  after  his  death. 


48  TWO  SIDES  TO   A  SAINT. 


virtues,  but  whom,  in  a  private  conversa- 
tion with  Mother  Angelique,*  he  denounces 
in  a  whisper  for  his  "dirty  tricks,"  as 
"  clever  in  men's  eyes  but  in  the  eyes  of  God 
a  reprobate.''  Perhaps  it  might  not  have 
changed  the  Duke's  course;  but  it  would 
have  been  better  for  the  memory  of  the 
saint. 

The  history  of  this  prince's  reign  is 
stained  on  every  page  with  plots  to  seize 
Geneva  by  perfidy,  by  purchased  treachery, 
by  ambuscade,  by  secret  attack  in  times  of 
plighted  peace,  under  cover  of  assurances 
of  his  friendship ;  so  that  it  was  not  with 
guileless  unsuspicion  as  to  what  might  be 
the  bearing  of  the  question,  that  Francis 
once  answered  his  sovereign's  inquiry: 
"What  should  be  done  with  Geneva?" — 
"There  is  no  doubt  that  heresy  would  be 
weakened  throughout  Europe  if  this  town, 
the  very  seat  of  Satan,  could  be  reduced 
and  subjugated."  And  he  went  on  to  indi- 
cate at  length  the  things  that  made  this 
little  town  of  15,000  souls  the  metropolis 
and  radiating  centre  of  the  reformed  faith. 

*  Sainte  Beuve  {Port  Royal,  I.,  257)  quotes  this  discrep- 
ancy with  admiration  in  proof  of  Francis'  practical 
shrewdness  and  finesse.  If  it  is  right  to  speak  of  a  saint 
as  taking-  pride  in  anything,  Francis  was  proud  of  his  bluff, 
outspoken  sincerity,  "a  Pancienne  gauloise."— " Je  ne 
sais  nullement  Part  de  mentir,  ni  de  dissimuler,  ni  de 

feindre  avec   dexterite Ce    que   j'ai  sur  les  levres, 

c'est  justement  ce  qui  sort  de  ma  pensee,...  je  hals  la 
duplicite  comme  la  mort.'"     Marsollier,  liv.  VIII .',  §  18. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  A  SAINT.  49 

Then,  proposing  certain  spiritual  methods, 
he  added  :  "I  know  these  remedies  are 
small  and  slow,  but  is  there  anything  else 
that  could  be  done  in  this  unhappy  and 
degenerate  age?"  And  then,  in  response 
to  a  word  of  encouragement  from  the  Duke, 
he  added  slyly:  "As  to  the  destruction  of 
the  town,  that  is  not  exactly  in  my  line  nor 
to  my  taste.  Your  Highness  has  more  ex- 
pedients for  that  than  I  could  dream  of.* 
He  conceals  many  things,  but  does  not  hide 
his  feelings  towards  the  city — his  city,  as 
he  calls  it — "that  den  of  thieves  and  out- 
laws." He  writes  to  the  Pope :  "  This 
town  is  to  heretics  and  devils  what  Rome 
is  to  angels  and  Catholics.  Every  good 
Catholic,  but  most  of  all  the  Pope  and  the 
Catholic  princes,  ought  to  do  his  best  to 
have  this  Babylon  demolished  or  converted." 
Simultaneously  with  the  preparations  for 
the  consecration  of  Francis  as  Bishop  and 
Prince  of  Geneva,  the  Duke,  stimulated  by 
such  talk  as  this  from  his  spiritual  adviser, 
carried  on  his  secret  preparations  for  that 
Escalade  which,  had  it  succeeded,  would 
have  anticipated,  in  the  course  of  history, 
the  horrors  of  the  sack  of  Magdeburg  by 
those  of  the  sack  of  Geneva.    It  was  plotted 

*  Deuxieme  discours  au  Due  de  Savoie.    (CEuvres,  XIV., 
76.) 


50  TWO   SIDES  TCfA   SAINT. 

for  the  darkest  night  in  the  year,  the  12th 
of  December,  o.S.,  1602.  About  the  end  of 
November,  Francis,  returning  thanks  to 
the  Chapter  of  his  cathedral  for  their  con- 
gratulations on  his  appointment,  bade  them: 
"  Good-bye  for  the  present,  expecting  soon 
to  meet  you  again  in  your  oivn  city."  * 
Thence  he  went  into  retreat  to  prepare  for 
the  solemnities  of  his  consecration.  His 
confessor,  on  this  occasion,  was  that  noted 
Scottish  Jesuit,  Father  Alexander,  who 
stood  a  few  nights  later  at  the  foot  of  the 
scaling-ladders  and  shrived  the  ruffians,  one 
by  one,  as  they  crept  up  the  wall  of  Geneva 
to  their  work  of  midnight  assassination.! 
How  the  cruel  and  perfidious  plot  was 
foiled,  and  how  the  Duke  slunk  back  to 
Turin  foaming  with  disappointed  rage,  is  it 
not  told  with  glee  in  every  Genevese  family 
the  world  over,  as  often  as  the  12th  of  De- 
cember comes  round?  One  of  the  exasper- 
ating sights  that  met  the  Duke's  eye  as  he 
rode  homeward  through  Annecy,  was  the 
long  train  of  sumpter -mules  sent  by  his  or- 
ders from  Turin,  laden  with  church  decora- 
tions and  altar  furniture  and  with  eighty 
hundredweight  of  wax  candles,  to  be  used 

*  Letter  42. 

t  This  fact  has  recently  been  developed  by  Mr.  Th. 
Claparede  in  a  paper  read  before  the  Archaeological  Soci- 
ety of  Geneva . 


TWO   SIDES   TO  A  SAINT.  51 


in  the  decoration  and  illumination  of  St. 
Peter's  at  Geneva,  when  its  prince-bishop 
should  celebrate  mass  at  Christmas  in  his 
own  cathedral  church. 

It  is  possible  that  for  fear  of  displeasing 
the  saint's  "sweetness,"  these  preparations 
had  all  been  concealed  from  his  too  sensitive 
mind  ;  that  he  had  no  conjecture  about  the 
mysterious  movement  of  troops  through  his 
diocese  ;  that  his  remark  to  his  canons  had 
no  reference  to  anything  in  particular  ;  and 
that  the  new  bishop,  looking  out  of  his  win- 
dow at  Annecy  at  the  train  from  Turin, 
wondered  in  his  heart  where  in  the  world 
all  that  church  gear  could  be  going  to.  We 
should  wrong  his  blessed  memory  if  we  were 
to  say  that  his  guilt  was  demonstrated.  But 
many  a  wretch  has  justly  been  hanged  on 
less  evidence  of  complicity  in  less  atrocious 
crime. 

It  is  not  needful  to  pursue  further  the 
course  of  the  life  of  Francis  de  Sales.  The 
traits  manifest  in  his  earlier  life  (though 
veiled  in  most  of  his  recent  biographies)  are 
to  be  recognized  in  all  his  subsequent  ca- 
reer.*    It  would  be  easy,  if  only  the  torrent 

*  His  labors  in  the  Pays  de  Gex  were  quite  of  the  same 
character  with  those  iu  the  Chablais,  except  that,  in- 
structed by  his  two  years'  experiment  in  the  Chablais,  he 
scattered  no  more  of  his  rhetorical  pearls  before  swine 
but  began  at  once  with  force.  See  Claparede,  Histoire 
des  Eghses  reformees  du  Pays  de  Gex  :  Brossard,  Histoire 


52  TWO   SIDES  TO  A  SAINT. 

of  fulsome  panegyric  would  assuage  long 
enough  to  give  the  opportunity,  to  present 
his  character  in  more  pleasing  aspects. 
There  were  noble  and  beautiful  things  in 
Francis.  But  one  tires  of  seeing  this  adroit 
and  courtier- like  fanatic,  with  his  duplicity 
and  his  cold-blooded  cruelty,  recommended 
in  standing  advertisements  to  the  abused 
public  as  "a  model  of  Christian  saintliness 
and  religious  virtue  for  all  time,"  as  having 
lived  "  a  life  as  sweet,  pure,  and  noble  as 
any  man  by  divine  help  has  been  permitted 
to  live  upon  earth;"  and  as  having  been 
"admirable  for  his  freedom  from  bigotry  in 
an  age  of  persecution."  Neither  can  we 
enter  fully  into  sympathy  with  those  to 
whom  "  it  is  a  matter  of  entire  thankfulness 
to  find  a  distinctively  Anglican  writer  set- 
ting forward  "  the  ferocious  and  perfidious 
dragonnacles  by  which  he  extinguished 
Christian  light  and  liberty  in  the  provinces 
south  of  Lake  Leman,  and  smote  that  lovely 
region  with  a  blight  that  lingers  on  it  visibly 
until  this  day,  "as  a  true  missionary  task  to 
reclaim  souls  from  deadly  error,  and  bring 
them  back  to   the  truth."  *     That  writer 

politique  et  relinieuse  du  Pays  de  Gex  :  Bourg-en-Bresse, 
1851;  Guillot,  Fr  de  Sales  et  les  Protestants  :  Geneve,  1873. 
The  legendary  story  of  the  mission  in  Gex  may  be  read  in 
-•ny  of  the  Lives  of  Francis. 

*  The  quotations  are  from  "  Opinions  of  the  Press,"  in 
Messrs.  Rivingtons'  Catalogue. 


TWO  SIDES   TO  A  SAINT.  58 


would  render  a  good  service,  not  only  to 
history,  but  to  practical  religion,  who  should 
give  the  world  a  true  picture  of  Francis  de 
Sales,  with  all  his  singular  graces  and  with 
his  crying  faults;  and  so  supersede  the 
myriads  of  impossible  fancy- portraits  with 
nimbus  and  wings,  with  eyes  rolling  in  mys- 
tical rapture,  and  with  the  everlasting  smirk 
of  "  sweetness  "  and  gentlenesg. 


HOW   THE    REV.    DR.    STONE    BET- 
TERED HIS  SITUATION 


HOW  THE 

REV.  DR.  STONE  BETTERED 

HIS  SITUATION. 


The  following  argument,  not  less  timely 
now  than  when  it  was  first  called  forth  by 
the  publication  of  Dr.  Stone's  book,  treats 
of  the  claims  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church 
from  a  neglected  point  of  view,  but  a  point 
which  commands  a  much  wider  and  juster 
view  of  the  Roman  system  than  the  point 
commonly  occupied  by  Protestant  contro- 
versialists. 

For  many  generations  it  has  been  a 
standing  accusation  against  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  that  it  has  a  tendency  to 
demoralize  society  and  the  individual  by 
issuing  certificates,  written  or  oral,  of  the 
forgiveness  of  sins,  and  of  the  remission  of 
the  penalties  of  them,  both  in  this  world 
and  the  world  to  come,  on  the  performance 
of  rites,  or  the  payment  of  money,  or  on 
other  conditions  different  from  those  re- 
quired in  the  gospel — repentance  and  faith. 

In  answer  to  this  accusation,  the  apolo- 
gists of  the  Roman  Church  have  constantly 


58  HOW  THE  REV.    DR.  STONE 

averred,  sometimes  with  a  great  show  of  in- 
dignation, that  these  certificates  of  forgive- 
ness of  sin  and  remission  of  penalty  and  as- 
surance of  salvation  do  not  mean,  and  are 
well  understood  not  to  mean,  what  their 
terms  import;  that  the  understanding  is 
distinct  and  explicit  between  the  Church 
and  its  devotees,  that  when  the  priest  says, 
"  I  absolve  thee/'  he  does  not  in  fact  ab- 
solve at  all,  and  that  the  forgiveness  of  the 
"  penitent/'  to  whom  these  words  have  been 
pronounced  in  the  confessional,  is  just  as 
entirely  contingent  on  his  true  repentance 
as  the  forgiveness  of  any  sinner  outside  of 
the  Church  can  be;  that  the  promise  given 
in  an  ' '  indulgence  '  of  the  remission  of 
purgatorial  torment,  notwithstanding  it  may 
be  absolute  in  form,  is  really  subject  to  sim- 
ilar conditions  :  and  that  the  grace  to  be 
conferred,  ex  ojwe  operato,  by  the  sacraments 
generally,  is  in  like  manner  dependent  on 
such  and  so  many  contingencies,  as  to  pre- 
clude the  clanger  that  any  person  will  be 
tempted  into  sin  by  assurance  of  safety;  that, 
if  at  any  time,  impenitent  persons  have 
been  induced  by  the  agents  of  the  Church 
to  purchase  indulgences  promising  to  remit 
the  penalties  of  their  sins,  these  promises, 
given  by  her  agents  in  her  name,  are  indig- 
nantly disavowed  and   repudiated    by   the 


BETTERED   HIS   SITUATION.  59 


Church— although    there    is    no    recorded 
instance  of  the  money  being  refunded. 

On  the  other  hand,  however,  an  opposite 
style  of  address  is  sometimes  taken  up  by 
this  Church  and  its  advocates— a  style  of  ad- 
dress  calculated  to  assure  those  who  have 
thought  themselves  shut  up  to  the  gospel 
promises  of  forgiveness  on  condition  of  re- 
pentance and  faith— that  there  is  something 
a  great  deal  more  certain  and  assured  to  be 
had  in  the  Church  of  Rome;  that  her  clergy 
have  a  peculiar  power  of  binding  and  loos- 
ing, which  other  clergymen  do  not  possess; 
that  there  is  a  gracious  virtue  in  her  sacra- 
ments,  which  cannot  be  found  in  others; 
that  her  pope,  especially,  has  control  over 
the  keys  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven.     There 
is  much  in  the  tone  of  her  teachings,  in  the 
language   of   her   sacraments,    and    in  the 
terms  of  her  indulgences  and  other  docu- 
ments that  corresponds  with  these  preten- 
sions. They  are  summed  up  in  the  persuasive 
language  of  Pope  Pius  IX.,  in  his  letter  of 
September  13,  1868,    addressed  to  Protes- 
tant Christians,  in  which  he  implores  them 
to  "rescue  themselves  from  a  state  in  which 
they  cannot  be  assured  of  their  own  salva- 
tion, "  and  come  into  his  fold,  where,  as  he 
implies,  they  can  be  assured  of  it. 

These  two  "  Phases  of  Catholicity,"  con- 


60  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.    STONE 

tradictory  as  they  are,  do,  nevertheless,  be- 
long to  the  same  system.  And  many  a 
luckless  polemic,  reasoning  from  one  set  of 
the  utterances  of  the  Church  of  Rome,  has 
been  suddenly  overwhelmed  with  the  Virtu- 
ous Indignation  and  Injured  Innocence  with 
which  his  antagonists  have  confronted  him 
with  the  other  set  of  utterances,  crying  out 
upon  him,  fi  Is  it  Honest  to  say  thus  and  so, 
when  here  are  passages  in  our  books  or  facts 
in  our  American  practice  which  say  just  the 
contrary  ?  " 

If  the  Church  of  Rome  could  be  driven 
up  to  choose  between  its  two  contradictory 
doctrines,  the  remaining  controversy  would 
be  a  short  one.  But  this  is  hopeless.  It 
clings  inexpugnably  to  the  fence,  ready  to 
drop  on  either  side  for  the  time,  as  the 
exigencies  of  controversy  may  require.  It 
moves  to  and  fro  in  its  double-corner  on  the 
checker-board,  and  challenges  defeat. 

In  the  representations  which  I  have  oc- 
casion to  make,  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
theology,  I  shall  draw  from  the  most 
trustworthy  sources,  giving  full  references 
in  the  margin.  And  I  do  not  despair,  in 
the  more  Christian  temper  which  we  thank- 
fully recognize,  in  recent  years,  as  governing 
both  sides  of  the  controversy,  of  rinding  that 
candid  scholars  on  the  opposite  side  acknowl- 


BETTERED   HIS    SITUATION.  61 


edge  that  I  have  written  with  at  least  honest 
and  sincere  intention,  and  that.,  albeit  under 
a  gently  satiric  form,  I  have  a  sober  argu- 
ment to  submit  which  is  worthy  of  a  serious 
answer — if  indeed  there  is  any  answer  to  be 
made. 

One  word  more  before  corning  to  the  ar- 
gument. I  wish  to  disclaim  any  personal 
disrespect  for  the  gentleman  whose  name  is 
used  in  the  title  of  this  article,  and  whose 
book  is  the  text  of  the  discussion.  His 
theological  position  is  demonstrably  prepos- 
terous ;  but  there  is  nothing  else  about  him 
that  is  not  worthy  of  all  respect. 

Dr.  Stone's  book,  "The  Invitation  Heed- 
ed,"* was  written  in  explanation  and  vin- 
dication of  his  sudden  going  over  from  the 
Protestant  Episcopal  to  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church,  just  before  the  Vatican  Council. 
"Without  criticising  it  in  detail,  we  propose 
rapidly  to  state  the  upshot  of  the  Eev.  Dr. 
Stone's  religious  change,  as  it  appears  to  us, 
and  to  foot  up  the  balance  of  spiritual  ad- 
vantage which  he  seems  to  have  gained 
by  it. 

In  October,  of  1868,  the  Rev.  James 
Kent  Stone,  P.P.,  a  minister  of  excellent 

*  The  Invitation  Heeded :  Reasons  for  a  Return  to 
Catholic  Unity.  By  James  Kent  Stone,  late  President  of 
Kenyon  College,  Gambier;  and  of  Hobart  College,  Geneva, 

M^  l£rk:    arjd  S-TD-     Catholic  Publication  Society. 
1870.     12mo,  pp.  341. 


H2  HOW   THE  REV.    DR.    STONE 

standing  in  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church, 
received,  in  common  with  the  rest  of  us,  a 
copy  of  a  letter  from  the  pope  of  Rome, 
in  which  he  was  affectionately  invited  to 
"rescue  himself  from  a  state  in  which  he 
could  not  be  assured  of  his  own  salvation," 
by  becoming  a  member  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church,  which  teaches,  by  the  way, 
that  as  soon  as  a  man  becomes  ' '  assured 
of  his  own  salvation  "it  is  a  dead  certainty 
that  he  will  be  damned.* 

Accordingly,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Stone,  deeply 
conscious  how  uncertain  and  perilous  is 
the  position  of  those  who  merely  com- 
mit themselves  in  well  doing,  with  sim- 
plicity and  sincerity,  to  the  keeping  of  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  according  to  his  promises, 
"hastens  to  rescue  himself  from  that  state, 
in  which  he  cannot  be  assured  of  his  own 
salvation,"  and  betters  himself  wonderfully 
as  follows  : 

1.  His  first  step  is  to  make  sure  of  his  re- 
generation and  entrance  into  the  true  church 
by  the  door  of  the  church,  which  is,  accord- 
ing to  his  new  teachers,  not  Christ,  but 
baptism. f  To  be  sure  he  has  once  been 
baptized,  and  the  Council  of  Trent  warns 
him  not  to  dare  affirm  that  baptism   admin- 

*  Act.  Cone.  Trid.,  Sess.  VI.,  Cap.  IX.,  XII.,  XIII. 
t  Concil.  Florent.,  "  vitae  spiritualis  janua." 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  63 


istered  by  a  heretic  (like  his  good  old  father) 
is  not  true  baptism.*     But  as  all  his  ever- 
lasting  interests    are    now    pending   on   a 
question    which    no    mortal     can    answer, 
to  wit,  whether  at  the  time   of  the  bap- 
tism     of     little     James,     being    then   of 
tender   age,  the   interior   intention  of  old 
Doctor  Stone  corresponded  with  a  certain 
doubtful  and  variously  interpreted  require- 
ment  of   the    Council  of    Trent— that   he 
should  "intend    to  do  what    the  Church 
does "f— it  is  well  to  make  his  "assurance 
of  salvation  "  doubly  sure,  by  a  "hypothet- 
ical baptism  "   from  the  hands  of  a  Roman 
Catholic  priest,  with  some  accompaniments 
which  although  "  not  of  absolute  necessity  to 
his  salvation,    are  of  great  importance"— 
such  as  a  little  salt  in  his   mouth  to   excite 
"a   relish   for  good  works,"  a  little  of  the 
priest's   spittle  smeared  upon  his   ears  and 
nostrils    to   «  open   him    into    an  odor  of 
sweetness,"  a  little  of  the  essential  "  oil  of 
catechumens "  on  his   breast   and   between 
his  shoulders,   and  of  the   "oil  of  chrism  " 
on  the  crown  of  his   head,    with   a  "white 
garment  "  on,  outside  of  his  coat  and  pan- 
taloons, and  a  lighted  candle  in  his  hand  in 
the  daytime.  %     If  there  is  a  way  of  meriting 

*  Concil.  Tricl.,  Canon  4,  De  Bapt~  — 

t  Concil.  Trid.,  Sess.  VII.,  Can.  11. 
X  See  the  Roman  Catechism. 


64  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 


heaven  by  a  process  of  mortification,  we 
have  little  doubt  that  it  must  be  for  a  re- 
spectable middle-aged  gentleman  who  has 
learned,  by  being  president  of  two  colleges, 
the  importance  of  preserving  his  personal 
dignity,  to  be  operated  upon  in  just  this 
way.  Nothing,  we  should  imagine,  could 
add  to  the  poignancy  of  his  distress,  and 
consequent  merit,  unless  it  should  be  to  have 
the  members  of  the  sophomore  class  present 
while  he  was  having  his  nose  ft  opened  into 
the  odor  of  sweetness." 

Doubtless  the  object  to  be  gained  is  amply 
worth  the  sacrifice,  since  it  is  to  "  rescue 
oneself  from  that  state  in  which  he  cannot 
be  assured  of  his  own  salvation,"  and  avoid 
that  "  eternal  misery  and  everlasting  destruc- 
tion," which,  according  to  the  authoritative 
catechism  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  is 
the  alternative  of  valid  baptism.  This 
second  ceremony,  be  it  remembered,  is  only 
a  hypothetical  one,  calculated  to  hit  him  if 
he  is  unbaptized;  but,  in  case  it  should  ap- 
pear in  the  judgment  of  the  last  day  that 
old  Dr.  Stone  had  intended  to  "do  what  the 
church  does  "  (it  being,  at  present,  not  infal- 
libly settled  what  such  an  intention  is),  then 
this  latter  and  merely  hypothetical  ceremo- 
nials is  to  be  held  to  have  been  no  baptism  at 
all,  but  null  and  void  to  all  intents  and  pur- 


EETTEKLD   HIS   SITUATION.  Co 

poses  whatsoever.  Bat  considering  that  the 
issues  of  eternity  are  pending  on  the  insol- 
uble question  as  to  the  validity  of  the  first 
baptism,  considering  that  a  defect  here  can 
never  be  supplied  to  all  eternity,  whether  by 
years  of  fidelity  in  other  sacraments,  or  by 
a3ons  of  torture  in  purgatorial  fire,  since  it 
is  only  by  baptism  that  "the  right  of  par- 
taking of  the  other  sacraments  is  acquired,"* 
it  is  nothing  more  than  common  prudence 
to  adopt  a  course  that  diminishes  by  at  least 
one-half  the  chances  of  a  fatal  defect.  It 
must  be  admitted  that  there  still  remains  a 
possibility  of  the  defect  of  intention  in  the 
second  act  as  well  as  in  the  first ;  such  things 
having  been  known  in  ecclesiastical  history 
as  the  purposed  "withholding  of  the  inten- 
tion'' in  multitudes  of  sacramental  acts  on 
the  part  of  an  unfaithful  priest.  Still,  it 
may  be  held,  perhaps,  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Stone, 
that  the  hypothetical  transaction  makes 
the  matter  nearly  enough  certain  for  all 
practical  purposes  (as  the  old  arithmetics 
used  to  say),  although  it  falls  a  good  deal 
short  of  that "  assurance  of  his  own  salva- 
tion "  to  which  he  was  invited  in  the  pope's 
letter. f 

But  presuming  that  between  his  two  bap- 

*  Dens,  De  Bapt.  Tractat. 

t  It  is  very  pleasant,  from  time  to  time,  as  one  trav- 
erses the  dreary  waste  of  "  commandments  contained  in 
ordinances  "  which  make  up  the  Romish  system,  to  come 


66  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.    STONE 

tisms  Dr.  Stone  is  validly  entered  into  tha 
Roman  Catholic  Church,  may  we  not  now 
congratulate  him  on  the  (hypothetical)  as- 
surance of  his  own  salvation  ?  Not  quite  yet. 
To  be  sure,  he  has  received  the  remission  of 
all  his  sins,  up  to  that  time,  both  original 
and  actual,  and  the  remission  of  the  punish- 
ment of  them,  both  temporal  and  eternal, 
and  has  been  (as  the  Holy  Father  promised 
in  his  letter  of  September,  1868,  already 
quoted)  "enriched  with  unexhausted  treas- 
ures" of  divine  grace.*  But  it  is  damnable 
heresy  not  to  acknowledge  that  "  he  may  lose 
the  grace/'  or  to  hold  "  that  it  is  possible  for 
him  to  avoid  all  sins — unless  by  special  priv- 
ilege from  God,  such  as  the  church  holds  to 

uponsome  admission  or  proviso  which,  fairly  interpreted, 
nullifies  all  the  rest.  The  Council  of  Trent,  for  instance, 
declares  that  "  without  the  washing-  of  regeneration 
(meaning  baptism),  or  the  desire  of  it,  there  can  be  no 
justification,"  and  teaches  that  an  unbeliever  brought  to 
embrace  Christianity,  not  having  the  opportunity  of  bap- 
tism but  yet  desiring  to  receive  it,  is"  baptized  in  desire" 
—the  desire  supplying  the  place  of  the  actual  sacrament, 
(See  Concil.  Trident,  Sess.  VI.,  Can.  1;  Sess.  VII.,  Can.  4. 
Also  Bishop's  Hay's  "Sincere  Christian,"  vol.1,  chap.  xx.). 
It  is  obvious  enough  that  the  just  interpretation  and  ap- 
plication of  these  very  Christian  teachings  would  blow 
the  "doctrine  of  intention  "  and  of  the  "opus  operatum" 
to  pieces.  But  the  thorough-going  Romanizers  scorn  to 
take  advantage  of  such  weak  concessions.  Cardinal 
Pallavicini  says  decidedly,  "There  is  nothing  repugnant 
in  the  idea  that  no  person  in  particular,  after  all  possible 
researches,  can  come  to  be  perfectly  sure  of  his  baptism. 
Nobody  can  complain  that  he  suffers  this  evil  without 
having  deserved  it.  God,  by  a  goodness  purely  arbitrary, 
delivers  the  one  without  delivering  the  other'"  (Quoted 
in  Bungener's  "  History  of  the  Council  of  Trent,"  p.  159.) 
This  line  of  argument  will  be  of  no  small  comfort  to  Dr. 
Stone  in  his  disappointment  about  the  "  assurance  of  his 
own  salvation." 

*  Catech.  Roman..  152-169. 


BETTERED  HIS   SITUATION.  67 


have  been  granted  to  the  Blessed  Virgin."* 
Grace  may  come    and    go,  but   orthodoxy 
agrees    with    experience   in   teaching    that 
"concupiscence,  which  is  the  fuel  of  sin,  re- 
mains, "f      It    is   damnable,    therefore,    to 
affirm  that  the  rest  of  the  seven  sacraments 
are  not  necessary  to  Dr.  Stone's  salvation  ;  J 
and  especially  to  affirm  that    "  it  is  possible 
for  him  if  he  shall   fall "  (as  he   inevitably 
will)    "after  baptism,    to  recover  his   lost 
righteousness  without  the  sacrament  of  pen- 
ance,'^ which   is  "  rightly  called  a  second 
plank  after  shipwreck;  r||  and  equally  dam- 
nable to   "deny  that  sacramental  confession 
is  necessary  to  salvation  ;  "^   or  to  " affirm 
that  in  order  to  receive  remission  of  sins  in 
the  sacrament  of  penance  it  is  not  necessary, 
jure  divino,  for  him  to  confess  all  and  every 
mortal  sin  which  occurs  to  his  memory  after 
due   and  diligent  premeditation — even  his 
secret  sins."** 

We  find,  therefore,  that  our  estimable 
friend  is  very,  very  far  indeed,  up  to  this 
point,  from  having  got  what  he  went  for. 
He  thought  he  was  stepping  upon  some- 
thing solid,  but  finds  himself  all  at  once  in 

*  Concil.  Trident.,  Sess.  vi.,  Can.  22. 
t  Oatech.  Roman.,  ubi  supra. 
X  Concil.  Trident.,  Sess.  vii.,  Can.  4. 
§  Ibid.,  Sess.  vi.,  Can.  29,  De  Justif. 
U  Ibid.,  Sess.  xiv.,  Can.  2. 
1  Ibid.,  Sess.  xiv.,  Can.  6. 
**  Ibid.,  Sess.  xiv.,  Can.  7. 


68  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

great  waters,  and  making  a  clutch  at  the 
"second  plank  after  shipwreck." 

A  certain  embarrassment  attends  him  at 
his  first  approach  to  the  sacrament  of  pen- 
ance. He  has  a  distinct  understanding  with 
the  church  that  all  sins  incurred  before  bap- 
tism, both  original  sins  and  actual  sins,  and 
all  the  punishment  of  them,  both  eternal 
punishment  in  hell  and  temporal  punish- 
ment in  this  world  or  in  purgatory,  are  ab- 
solutely and  entirely  remitted  in  that  sacra- 
ment, and  that  no  confession  or  penance  is 
due  on  their  account.* 

But  now  the  painful  question  arises, 
When  was  he  baptized  ?  He  may  well 
hope  that  the  transaction  of  his  good 
old  heretic  of  a  father  and  of  his  spon- 
sors in  baptism,  when  they  called  him 
M.  or  N.,  was  only  an  idle  ceremony  ;  for 
in  that  case  the  long  score  of  his  acts  and 
deeds  of  heresy  and  schism  all  his  life  through 
is  wiped  out  by  the  hypothetical  baptism, 
and  he  may  begin  his  confessions  from  a 
very  recent  date.  But  if  his  father  had  the 
right  sort  of  intention,  then  this  hypotheti- 
cal baptism  is  no  baptism  at  all,  and  he  is  to 
begin  at  the  beginning  with  his  penance. 
Inasmuch  as  neither  man  nor  angel  can 
settle  the  question,  he  will  act  wisely  to  fol- 

*  Catech.  Roman.,  ubi  supra. 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  G9 

low  the  safe  example  of  St.  Augustine,  and 
begin  his  confessions  with  owning  up  frankly 
to  the  indiscretions  (to  use  the  mildest  term), 
with  which,  in  early  infancy,  he  aggravated 
the  temper  of  his  nurse,  and  peradventure 
disturbed  the  serenity  of  his  reverend  parent. 
Doubtless  it  will  make  a  long  story,  but 
what  is  that,  when  one  is  seeking  for  the 
"  assurance  of  his  own  salvation  "  ?  And  oh 
the  ]oy — the  calm,  serene  peace — when  he 
shall  hear  at  last  from  the  lips  of  the  duly 
accredited  representative  of  the  church  the 
operative  sacramental  words,  Eyo  absolvo  te, 
and  know  at  last,  after  all  these  forty  or  fifty 
years  of  painful  uncertainty,  that  at  least  for 
this  little  moment  he  is  in  a  state  of  for- 
giveness and  peace  with  God. 

But  softly  !  We  are  on  the  very  verge, 
before  we  think  of  it,  of  repeating  that 
wicked  calumny  upon  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  against  which  Father  Hecker  so  in- 
dignantly protests,  saying  : 

"Is  it  Honest  to  persist  in  saying  that 
Catholics  believe  their  sins  are  forgiven, 
merely  by  the  confession  of  them  to  the 
priest,  without  a  true  sorrow  for  them,  or  a 
true  purpose  to  quit  them — when  every 
child  finds  the  contrary  distinctly  and  clear- 
ly  stated   in   the   catechism   which    he    is 


70  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

obliged  to  learn  before  he  is  admitted  to  the 
sacraments  ?  "  * 

Of  course,  it  is  not  honest  !  We  have  not 
examined  the  catechism  in  question,  for  the 
reason  that  if  we  were  to  quote  it  against 
the  church  of  Rome  we  should  be  told  that 
it  was  not  authoritative,  and  be  scornfully 
snubbed  for  pretending  to  refer  to  what  was 
not  one  of  their  standards — but  of  course  it 
is  conclusive  against  our  honesty  when  they 
quote  it.  To  be  sure,  the  priest  says  in  so 
many  words:  "  I  absolve  thee  from  thy  sins, 
in  the  name  of  the  Father,  and  of  the  Son, 
and  of  the  Holy  Ghost;  "  and  Bishop  Hay, 
in  a  volume  commended  by  the  proper  au- 
thorities to  the  confidence  of  the  faithful, 
declares  that  "  Jesus  Christ  has  passed  his 
sacred  word  that  when  they  (the  priests) 
forgive  a  penitent's  sins  by  pronouncing  the 
sentence  of  absolution  upon  him,  they  are 
actually  forgiven."!  But  then  nothing  is 
better  established  than  that  these  author- 
ized books  of  religious  instruction  may  be 
repudiated  at  discretion  as  of  no  authority 
at  all,  whenever  the  exigency  requires  it. 
Then  the  Catechism  of  the  Council  of  Trent 
says  in  terms:  "Our  sins  are  forgiven  by 
the  absolution  of  the  priest;"  \  "the  absolu- 

*  Tract  of  the  Catholic  Publication  Society. 
+  Sincere  Christian,  Vol.  II.,  p.  69. 
J  Catech.  Roman,  p.  239. 


BETTERED   HIS  SITUATION.  7i 


tion  of  the  priest  which  is  expressed  in 
words,  seals  the  remission  of  sins,  which  it 
accomplishes  in  the  soul ; "  *  "  unlike  the 
authority  given  to  the  priests  of  the  old 
law,  to  declare  the  leper  cleansed  from  his 
leprosy,  the  power  with  which  the  priests 
of  the  new  law  are  invested  is  not  simply  to 
declare  that  sins  are  forgiven,  but  as  min- 
isters of  God,  really  to  absolve  from  sin."  f 
Thus  the  Catechism  of  the  Council  of  Trent; 
but  bless  your  simple  soul  !  it  is  not  the 
Catechism  of  the  Council  that  is  infallible, 
but  only  the  Decrees  of  the  Council ;  and 
although  these  do,  in  their  obvious  mean- 
ing, seem  to  say  the  same  thing,  neverthe- 
less Dr.  Stone  will  find,  when  he  comes  to 
search  among  them  in  hopes  to  "read 
his  title  clear  "  to  divine  forgiveness  on  the 
ground  of  having  received  absolution  from 
the  priest,  that  what  they  say  is  qualified  by 
so  many  saving  clauses,  and  modified  by  so 
many  counter-statements,  that  the  seeker 
for  the  assurance  of  his  own  salvation  is  as 
far  as  ever  from  being  able  to 

"  bid  farewell  to  every  fear, 
And  wipe  his  weeping  eyes." 

Only  one  thing  is  absolutely  certain  ;    and 
that  is  that  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  be 

*  Ibid.,  p.  240. 

f  Ibid.,  see  the  various  Canons  of  Sessions  vi.  and  xiv\, 
of  the  Council  of  Trent,  above  quoted. 


72  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 


forgiven  without  absolution;  but  whether  he 
is  forgiven,  or  is  going  to  be,  now  that  he 
has  received  his  absolution,  does  not  bv  anv 
means  so   distinctly  appear.      For    "if  he 
denies  that  in  order  to  the  entire  and  per- 
fect forgiveness  of  sins,  three  acts  are  re- 
quired in  the  penitent,  to  wit,   Contrition, 
Confession,   and    Satisfaction,   he   is   to  be 
Anathema,"*    which,    if    we    understand 
it   correctly,    is  quite  another    thing  from 
being  forgiven  and  assured  of  his  salvation. 
Now  Contrition,  according  to  the  same  in- 
fallible   authority,    "is    the    distress    and 
horror  of  the  mind  on  account  of  sin  com- 
mitted, with  the  purpose  to  sin  no  more." 
"  It  includes  not  only  the  ceasing  from  sin, 
but  the  purpose  and  commencement  of   a 
new  life    and   hatred  of  the  old."f     It  is 
"produced  by  the  scrutiny,  summing  up, 
and  detestation  of  sins,  with  which  one  re- 
counts his  past  years  in  the  bitterness  of  his 
soul,  with  pondering  the  weight,  multitude, 
and  baseness  of  his  sins,  the  loss  of  eternal 
happiness,   and    the    incurring    of  eternal 
damnation,  together  with  the  purpose  of  a 
better  life."  J     Now  it  is  important  for  Dr. 
Stone  to  understand  (as  doubtless  he  has 
been  told  by  this  time)  that  although  this 

*Conc.  Trid.,  Sess.  xiv.  Can.  4. 
+  Ibid.,  Sess.  xiv.,  Cap.  l 
J  Ibid.,  Sess.  xiv.,  Can.  5. 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  73 


will  be  of  no  avail  to  him  without  the  abso- 
lution, or  that  at  least  the  desire  for  the  ab- 
solution,* nevertheless  the  absolution  will 
be  of  none  effect  unless  the  contrition  shall 
have  been  adequately  performed. 

Furthermore,  a  second  part  of  the  sacra- 
ment is  confession,  and  there  is  an  awful 
margin  of  uncertainty  about  this  act ;  for  it 
is  damnable  to  deny  that  "it  is  necessary, 
jure  divino,  in  order  to  forgiveness  of  sins, 
to  confess  all  and  every  mortal  sin  which 
may  be  remembered  after  due  and  diligent 
premeditation."  f  But  which  of  his  sins  are 
mortal  and  which  venial,  it  is  simply  im- 
possible for  the  Rev.  Dr.  Stone  to  know  by 
this  time,  for  it  is  a  life's  labor  to  learn  the 
distinctions  between  them  from  the  theolo- 
gians, and  when  you  have  learned  the  dis- 
tinctions, you  have  no  certainty  about  them, 
for  they  never  have  been  infallibly  defined, 
and  the  doctors  disagree.  It  may  be  tedi- 
ous, but  it  is  obviously  necessary,  in  order 
to  the  assurance  of  his  salvation,  for  the 
doctor  to  make  a  clean  breast  of  all  the 
sins,  big  and  little,  that  he  may  remember 
"after  due  and  diligent  premeditation. 
But  what  degree  of  premeditation  is  "  due 
and  "  diligent "  is  painfully  vague,  consider 

f  Ibid.,  Seas  xiv.,  Cap.  4. 
*  Ibid.,  Sess.  xiv.,  Can.  7. 


74  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

ing  how  much  is  depending  on  it.  It  were 
well  he  should  give  his  whole  time  and 
attention  to  it.  But  even  then  he  would  be 
unable  to  judge  with  exactness  when  it  was 
accomplished. 

"  Exactly  so ! ,:  doubtless  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Stone  would  say:  "and  herein  consists  the 
happiness  of  us  who  have  i  rescued  ourselves 
from  the  state  in  which  we  could  not  be  as- 
sured of  our  own  salvation' — that  we  have 
the  advantage  of  a  divinely  authorized 
priest,  with  power  of  binding  and  loosing, 
who  shall  guard  us  from  self  deception  and 
mistake,  and  certify  us  with  sacramental 
words  that  all  these  uncertain  conditions  are 
adequately  fulfilled,  and  assure  us,  in  so 
many  words,  that  our  sins  are  remitted.  Oh, 
the  comfort  of  this  distinct  assurance  from 
the  Church  ! — this  blessed  sacrament  of 
penance  ! — this  second  plank  after  ship- 
wreck ! " 

Poor  man  !  He  has  learned  by  this  time 
that  his  priest  does  not  undertake  to  certify 
him  of  anything  of  the  sort — that  the  abso- 
lution is  pronounced  on  the  presumption 
that  his  own  part  of  the  business  has  been 
fully  attended  to,  but  that  if  his  contrition 
or  his  confession  has  been  defective,  that  is 
his  own  look-out,  and  he  must  suffer  the 
consequences,  even  be  they  everlasting  per- 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  75 


dition.      The  absolution,  in  that  case,  does 
not  count  at  all.* 

"But,"  thinks  the  Rev.  Dr.  Stone,  a 
little  concerned  about  the  assurance  of 
his  salvation,  "if  all  the  issues  of  eternal 
life  are  to  turn  on  a  question  of  my  own 
consciousness,  of  which  no  one  is  to  judge 
but  myself,  I  do  not  see  how  I  am  so 
much  better  off  on  the  point  of  assurance 
than  when  I  was  a  Protestant,  and  had 
the  distinct,  undoubted  promise  of  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  himself  of  salvation  on  condi- 
tion of  repentance  and  faith."  We  feel  for 
the  honest  man's  disappointment,  but  can 
only  recommend  to  him,  in  his  present 
situation,  to  carry  his  trouble   to  his  new 

*  "As  the  Church  may  sometimes  err  with  respeet  to 
persons,  it  may  happen  that  such  an  one  who  shall  have 
been  loosed  in  the  eyes  of  the  Church,  may  be  bound  be- 
fore God,  and  that  he  whom  the  Church  shall  have  bound 
may  be  loosed  when  he  shall  appear  before  Him  who 
knovveth  all  things."  Pope  Innocent  III.,  Epistle  ii., 
quoted  in  Bungener's  "  History  of  the  Council  of  Trent." 
We  beg  pardon  for  citing  the  language  of  a  pope  as  an 
authority,  since  it  is  recognized  on  all  hands  that  hardly 
anything  is  more  unauthorized  and  fallible  than  the  say- 
ings of  a  pope,  excepting  only  on  those  occasions  when 
he  speaks  ex  cathedra— and  precisely  when  that  is,  no 
mortal  can  tell  with  certainty. 

Let  us  try  what  a  cardinal  will  say:  "  Without  a  deep 
and  earnest  grief,  and  a  determination  not  to  sin  again, 
no  absolution  of  the  priest  has  the  slightest  worth  or 
avail  in  the  sight  of  God  ;  on  the  contrary,  any  one  who 
asks  or  obtains  absolution,  without  that  sorrow^instead  of 
thereby  obtaining  forgiveness  of  his  sins,  commits  an 
enormous  sacrilege,  and  adds  to  the  weight  of  his  guilt, 
and  goes  away  from  the  feet  of  his  confessor  still  more 
heavily  laden  than  when  he  approached  him."  Wiseman 
on  the  Doctrines  of  the  Church,  vol.  ii..  p.  10. 

There  would  seem  to  be  nearly  the  same  amount  and 
quality  of  comfort  for  tender  consciences,  and  "  assur- 
ance of  salvation  "  here,  as  maybe  found  (for  example) 
in  "  Edwards  on  the  Affections." 


70  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

advisers.  The  best  advice  they  can  give 
him  will  perhaps  be  that  which  certain 
other  high  ecclesiastics,  of  unquestionable 
regularity  of  succession  and  validity  of  or- 
dination once  gave  to  a  distressed  inquirer — 
"What  is  that  to  us?  see  thou  to  that!" 

It  begins  to  look  extremely  doubtful 
whether  we  shall  be  able  to  get  the  Rev. 
James  Kent  Stone  to  heaven  at  all,  on  this 
course,  notwithstanding  he  has  come  so  far 
out  of  his  way  to  make  absolutely  sure  of 
it.  But  supposing  all  these  difficulties  ob- 
viated, and  that  by  a  special  revelation  (it 
is  impossible  to  conceive  of  any  other  means 
of  coming  at  it)  he  discovers  that  his  bap- 
tism and  contrition  and  confession  are  all 
right,  and  furthermore  that  the  priest  has 
had  the  necessary  "  intention  "  in  pronounc- 
ing the  absolution,  and  supposing  a  number 
of  other  uncertainties  incident  to  this  way 
of  salvation,  but  which  we  have  no  time  to 
attend  to,  to  be  entirely  obviated,  how 
happy  he  must  be,  post  tot  discrimina 
tutus,  assured  of  the  forgiveness  of  all  his 
sins,  and  how  delightful  the  prospect  set 
before  him — 

"  Sweet  fields  arrayed  in  living  green. 
And  rivers  of  delight ! " 

Alas,  no  !  If  the  Rev.  Dr.  Stone  has  any 
idea  as  this,  it  is  only  a  remnant  of   the 


BETTERED   HIS  SITUATION.  ?7 


crude  notions  which  he  picked  up  in  the 
days  of  his  heresy,  by  the  private  interpre- 
tation of  the  Scriptures.     Let  him  now  un- 
derstand that  it  is  damnable  error  to  hold 
"that  when  God  forgives  sins  he  always  re- 
mits the  whole  punishment  of  them."*  The 
eternal  punishment,  indeed,  is  remitted  ;  but 
the  temporal  punishment  which  remains  to 
be  executed  may  reach  so  far  into  the  world 
to  come  that  it  is  impossible  to  predict  the 
end  of  it.     In  fact,  the  characteristic  vague- 
ness in  which  all  the  most  important  matters 
tl»t  pertain  to  one's  salvation  are  studiously 
involved  in  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  is 
remarkably  illustrated  in  this  matter  of  pur- 
gatorial torment.     The  nature  of  it  is  doubt- 
ful.    The  majority  of  theologians  hold  that 
it  is  effected  by  means  of  literal,  material 
fire— but  that  is  only  "a  pious  opinion," 
and  will  not  be  known  for  certain  until  the 
next    time  the   pope   speaks   "out   of  his 
chair."     The  degree  of  it  is  doubtful.     St. 
Thomas  Aquinas  thinks  that  it  exceeds  any 
pain  known  in  his  life ;  Bonaventura  and 
Bellarmine  guess  that  the  greatest  pains  in 
purgatory  are  greater  than  the  greatest  in 
this  world ;  but  they  are  inclined  to  think 
that  the  least  of  the  pains  is  not   greater 

*Concil.  Trident.,  Sess.  xiv.,  Can.  12.  See  also  Sess.  vi., 
Can.  30. 


78  HOW  THE  REV.    DR.   STONE 

than  the  greatest  in  this  world.*  But 
the  duration  of  purgatorial  torment  is 
the  most  uncertain  thing  of  all.  Some 
think  it  will  last  only  a  little  while  ; 
others  that  it  will  endure  for  years  and  ages. 
The  Church  either  don't  know,  or  won't  tell. 
The  most  distinctly  settled  thing  about  the 
whole  business  seems  to  be  this :  that  no  one 
was  ever  yet  known  to  be  delivered  from  pur- 
gatory so  long  as  there  was  any  more  money 
to  be  got  out  of  his  family  by  keeping  him 
in. 

Is  it  not,  now,  rather  a  rough  disappoint- 
ment to  a  man  who  has  done  so  much,  and 
travelled  so  far,  on  the  promise  of  a  clear  and 
"  assured  "  view  of  his  future  happiness,  to 
bring  him  through  all  those  perils  to  the  top 
of  his  Mount  Pisgah,  and  bid  him  look  off 
on  a — lake  of  fire  and  brimstone  ?  We  put 
it  to  the  pope,  in  behalf  of  our  deceived  and 
injured  fellow-citizen— is  it  the  fair  thing  ? 

Well,  after  all,  ten  thousand  years  of  pur- 
gatory, more  or  less,  will  not  so  much  mat- 
ter to  our  friend,  so  long  as  he  is  "assured 
of  his  own  salvation  "  from  eternal  perdition. 
Ay;  there's  the  rub.  He  is  not  assured. 
Supposing  it  is  all  right  thus  far,  with  his 
baptism  and  confirmation  and  penance 
(and  we  have  not  stated  a  half  of  the  diffi- 

*  Dens,  De  Purgatorio. 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  79 


culties  of  this  supposition),  he  is  now  indeed 
in  a  state  of  grace,  and  all  his  sins  are  for- 
given, albeit  part  of  the  punishment  of  them 
is  liable  still  to  be  inflicted  in  purgatory.    If 
he  dies  now,  happy  man  !  for  (always  suppos- 
ing as  above)  he  is  sure  of  being  saved,  sooner 
or  later.    But  he  has  no  certainty  of  remain- 
ing in  this  state  of  grace  for  an  hour.  And  the 
Church  (kind  mother  !)  has  provided  for  the 
security  of  her  children  by  other  sacraments, 
notably  the  sacrament  of  the  Eucharist.    Dr. 
Stone  has  undoubtedly,  in  his  heretic  days, 
read  the   sixth   chapter  of  John,  with  the 
query,  What  if  the  Roman  interpretation  of 
these  promises  is  the  true  one,  and  in  order 
to  have  eternal  life,  I  am  required  to  eat  the 
flesh  and  drink  the  blood  of  the  Son  of  Man, 
literally,    in   the    transubstantiated    bread 
and  wine  ;  and  he  now  recalls  the  Lord's 
promise,   "  if  any  man  eat  of  this  bread  he 
shall  live  forever  ?  "*— and  he  finds  no  small 
comfort  in  it.     It  is  not  pleasant  to  discover, 
indeed,  that  the  Church,  even  granting  the 
interpretation  of  the  passage,  declares  it  of 
none  effect,  giving  it  to  be  understood  that 
thousands  upon  thousands  have  eaten  the 
veritable  "  body  and  blood,  soul  and  divin- 

*  John  vi.,  51;  also  58. 

"  Whoso  eateth  my  flesh  and  drinketh  my  blood  hath 
sternal  life." 
Ibid.,  vi.,  54. 


80  HOW  THE  REV.  DR.    STONE 


ity"  of  the  Lord,  and  gone,  nevertheless, 
into  eternal  death.  But  yet  your  "  anxious 
inquirer  "  does  seem  to  come  nearer  now  to 
what  he  was  looking  for — a  sacrament  that 
shall  do  its  saving  work  on  him  independ- 
ently of  the  presence  of  that,  the  necessity 
of  which  casts  a  doubt  on  all  Protestant 
hopes — faith  on  the  part  of  the  partaker. 
This  is  the  satisfaction  of  the  doctrine  of  the 
opus  operatum,  that  it  makes  the  saving 
virtue  of  the  sacrament  to  depend,  not  on 
what  it  is  difficult  for  the  recipient  to  ascer- 
tain— his  own  faith;  but  on  what  it  is  abso- 
lutely impossible  for  him  to  ascertain — the 
intention  of  the  priest.  And  not  this  alone. 
Before  the  priest,  even  with  the  best  of  in- 
tentions, has  any  power  to  consecrate  the 
bread,  and  transform  it  into  "  the  body  and 
blood,  soul  and  divinity'*  of  the  Lord,  he 
must  have  been  ordained  by  a  bishop  who 
should,  at  the  time  of  ordaining,  hare  had 
"  the  intention  of  doing  what  the  Church 
does,"  and  who  in  turn  should  have  been  or- 
dained with  a  good  intention  by  another 
bishop  with  a  good  intention,  and  so  on  ad 
infinitum,  or  at  least  ad  Pctrum.  And  when 
we  bear  in  mind  that  the  validity  of  the 
baptism  of  each  of  these  depends  just  as 
absolutely  on  so  many  unknown  and  un- 
knowable "intentions/*  and  that  in  case  of  the 


BETTEFED  HIS  SITUATION.  8l 


invalidity  of  their  baptism,  which  is  "the 
gate  of  the  sacraments,"  they  were  incapable 
of  receiving  ordination  themselves,  and  so  in- 
capable of  conferring  it,  the  chance  of  Dr. 
Stone's  ever  getting  a  morsel  of  genuine, 
certainly  attested  "body  and  blood,  soul  and 
divinity"  between  his  lips,  becomes,  to  a 
mathematical  mind,  infinitesimal.  There 
have  been  cases  of  ecclesiastics  who  in  their 
death-bed  confessions  have  acknowledged 
the  withholding  of  multitudes  of  "inten- 
tions."' Who  can  guess  what  multitudes 
besides  have  been  withheld  with  never  a 
confession,  or  with  a  confession  which  has 
never  been  heard  of.  But  the  wilful  with- 
holding need  not  be  supposed.  "  The  small- 
est mistake,  even  though  made  involuntari- 
ly, nullifies  the  whole  act."  * 

*  Pope  Innocent  III.,  Ep.  ix.  "The  Council  of  Florence 
had  pronounced  the  same  opinion.  .  .  .  Let  an  infidel 
or  a  dreamy  priest  baptize  a  child  without  having  seri- 
ously the  idea  of  baptizing  it,  that  child,  if  he  die,  is  lost; 
let  a  bishop  ordain  a  priest,  without  having  actually  and 
formally,  from  absence  of  mind  or  any  other  cause,  the 
idea  of  "conferring  the  priesthood,  and  behold,  we  have  a 
priest  who  is  not  a  priest,  and  those  whom  he  shall  baptize, 
marry  or  absolve,  will  not  be  baptized,  married  or  ab- 
solved. The  pope  himself,  without  suspecting  it,  might 
have  been  ordained  in  this  manner ;  and  as  it  is  from 
him  that  everything  flows,  all  the  bishops  of  the  Church 
might  some  day  find  themselves  to  be  false  bishops,  and 
all  the  priests  false  priests,  without  there  being  any  possi- 
bility of  restoring  the  broken  link."  Bungener,  "  Hist,  of 
the  Council  of  Trent,"  pp.  158, 159.  The  author  evidently 
mistakes  in  making  the  validity  of  baptism  to  depend  on 
priestly  ordination.  That  alone  of  the  sacraments  is 
valid  if  administered  (with  intention)  by  a  "  Jew,  pagan, 
or  heretic." 

Bungener  need  not  have  put  the  case  hypothetically. 
Writing  at   the   period  of    the   Great  Western    Schism, 


82  HOW  THE   REV.    DR.    STONE 

The  hope  of  salvation  through  the  sacra- 
ments of  the  Church  grows  dimmer  and 
dimmer.  It  is  well  for  our  neophyte  to 
cast  about  him  and  see  if  there  be  found  no 
adjuvants  that  may  reinforce  in  some  meas- 
ure that  "  assurance  of  his  salvation,"  to 
which  the  Holy  Father  has  somewhat  incon- 
siderately invited  him.  "  It  is  a  good  and 
useful  thing, "says  the  Council  of  Trent, 
"suppliantly  to  invoke  the  saints,  and  .  .  . 
to  flee  for  refuge  to  their  prayers,  help  and 
assistance. "  It  is  commonly  represented  to 
Protestants  that  this  is  a  mere  recommenda- 
tion, and  that  nobody  is  required  to  invoke 
the  saints  ;  but  Dr.  Stone  has  by  this  time 
been  long  enough  under  discipline  to  have 
found  out  that  this  is  nothing  but  a  polite 

"the  papal  secretary,  Coluccio  Salutato,  paints  in  strong 
colors  the  universal  uncertainty  and  anguish  of  con- 
science produced  by  the  Schism,  and  his  own  conclusion 
as  a  Papalist  is  that  as  all  ecclesiastical  jurisdiction  is 
derived  from  the  pope,  and  as  a  pope  invalidly  elected 
cannot  give  what  he  does  not  himself  possess,  no  bishops 
or  priests  ordained  since  the  death  of  Gregory  XI.  could 
guarantee  the  validity  of  the  sacraments  they  adminis- 
tered. It  followed  according  to  him,  that  any  one  who 
adored  the  Eucharist  consecrated  bj-  a  priest  ordained  in 
schism  worshipped  an  idol.  Such  was  the  condition  of 
Western  Christ endom." — The  Pope  and  the  Council,  by 
Janus,  p.  240. 

It  is  doubtless,  with  reference  to  difficulties  like  these, 
that  saving  clauses  are  introduced  into  the  utterances  of 
the  Church  :  "Without  the  sacraments  or  the  desire  for 
them;"  "if any  man  wilfully  separate  from  the  com- 
munion of  the  Holy  See,"  etc.  But  if  these  clauses  save 
the  difficulties  of  the  Church's  doctrine,  then  they  destroy 
the  doctrine  itself.  If  the  good  intentions  of  the  penitent 
are  what  secure  to  him  the  grace  of  the  sacraments,  then 
that  grace  does  not  depend  on  the  intention  of  the  priest; 
and  the  provision  which  so  many  souls  are  yearning  for,  of 
a  through  ticket  to  heaven  that  does  not  depend  on  their 
own  interior  character,  is  miserably  cut  off. 


BETTERED    HIS   SITUATION.  83 

pretence,  and  to  be  convinced  that  if  there 
is  anything  to  be  gained  by  saint-worship, 
he  had  better  be  about  it,  for  "help  and 
assistance  "  are  what  he  is  sadly  in  need  of. 
But  to  which  of  the  saints  shall  he  take  ref- 
uge? for  there  is  an  embarras  de  ricli- 
esses  here.  As  to  some  of  them,  there  is  a 
serious  and  painful  uncertainty,  as  in  the 
case  of  Mrs.  Harris,  as  to  whether  there  is 
"any  such  a  person."  As  to  others,  there  is 
a  strong  human  probability  that  in  the 
"unpleasantness"  that  prevailed  between 
heathen  and  Christian  in  the  early  times,  they 
were  on  the  wrong  side.  And  in  general,  the 
Church  fails  to  give  certain  assurance,  as  de 
fide,  concerning  them,  that  they  are  yet  in 
a  position  to  act  effectively  as  intercessors — 
whether,  in  fact,  they  are  not  to  this  day 
roasting  in  purgatory,  and  in  sorer  need  of 
our  intercession  than  we  of  theirs.  The 
Church,  we  say,  has  not  pronounced  assured- 
ly and  defide  on  this  point ;  and  what  Dr. 
Stone  is  invited  to  by  the  Holy  Father,  and 
what  doubtless  he  means  to  get,  is  assurance, 
not  "pious  opinion." 

It  will  be  "  safer  "  for  Dr.  Stone  "  to  seek 
salvation  through  the  Virgin  Mary  "  than 
directly  from  Jesus.  So  at  least  he  is  taught 
in  books  authorized  and  indorsed  by  the 
Church.     But  this  is  a  very  slender  gain,  for 


84  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

the  same  books  assure  him  that  without  the 
intercession  of  Mary  there  is  no  safety  at  all — 
that  "  the  intercession  is  not  only  useful  but 
necessary  " — that  "  to  no  one  is  the  door  of 
salvation  open  except  through  her" — that 
"  our  salvation  is  in  her  hands " — that 
"Mary  is  the  hope  of  our  salvation ;"  *  so 
that  the  amount  of  this  assurance  (if  one 
could  be  assured  of  its  authority)  is  only 
this,  that  it  is  better  than  nothing  at  all. 

Undoubtedly,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Stone  would 
do  well  to  get  him  a  scapular.  "About 
the  year  1251,  the  Holy  Virgin  appeared  to 
the  blessed  St.  Simon  Stock,  an  English- 
man, and  giving  him  her  scapular,  said  to 
him  that  those  who  wore  it  should  be  safe 
from  eternal  damnation."  Furthermore, 
"  Mary  appeared  at  another  time  to  Pope 
John  XXII.,  and  directed  him  to  declare  to 
those  who  wore  the  above-mentioned  scapu- 
lar, that  they  should  be  released  from  pur- 

*  See  "  The  Glories  of  Mary,"  by  St.  Alphonsus  Liguori, 
approved  by  John,  Archbishop  of  New  York  ;  chapter  v., 
on  "the  need  we  have  of  the  intercession  of  Mary  for 
our  salvation."  It  has  been  certified  by  the  pope  in 
the  act  of  canonization  that  the  writings  of  St.  Alphon- 
sus contain  nothing  worthy  of  censure.  But  as  it  is, 
up  to  this  present  writing,  impossible  to  say  certainly 
whether  this  was  one  of  the  pope's  infallible  utterances 
or  one  of  his  fallible  ones— there  we  are  again,  in  an 
uncertainty. 

For  a  full  collection  of  authorized  Roman  Catholic 
teachings,  to  the  effect  that  "it  is  impossible  for  any  to 
be  saved  who  turn  away  from  Mary,  or  is  disregarded  by 
her,"  see  Pusey's  Eirenicon,  p.  99,  seqq.— bearing  in  mind, 
however,  the  claim  of  the  efenders  of  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic system,  that  their  Church  is  not  to  be  considered  re- 
sponsible for  its  own  authorized  teachings. 


BETTERED   HIS   SITUATION.  85 


gatory  on  the  Saturday  after  death  "  ;    this 
the   same   pontiff   announced  in    his   bull, 
which  was  afterwards  confirmed  by  "  several 
other  popes. "  *     This,  declared  in  a  book 
which  is  guaranteed  by  a  pope  to  contain  no 
false  doctrine,  is  really  the  nearest  that  we 
can  find  in  the  entire  Roman  system  to  an 
assurance  of  salvation.      But  to  the  utter 
dismay  of  poor  Dr.  Stone,  just  as  he  is  on 
the  point  of  closing  his  hand  on  what  the 
pope  had  invited  him  to — "laying  hold/' 
as  an  old  writer  expresses  it,  "on  eternal 
life"  in  the  form  of  a  scapular — he  discov- 
ers not  only  that  Pope  Paul  V.,  in    1612, 
added   a   sort   of    codicil    to    the   Virgin's 
promise,  which  makes  it  doubtful,  but  in 
general,   that   the  inerrant   author   of  the 
Glories  of  Mary  "protests  that  he  does  not 
intend  to  attribute  any  other  than  purely 
human  authority  to  all  the  miracles,  revela- 
tions and  incidents  contained  in  this  book.vf 
But  "purely  human  authority"  is  not  ex- 
actly what  we  care  to  risk  our  everlasting 
salvation  on  ;  is  it,  Dr.  Stone  ? 

Nothing  seems  to  remain  for  our  bewil- 
dered friend  but  to  apply  for  indulgences. 
To  be  sure,  he  does  not  yet  know  that  he 
has    ever    been    effectually    loosed    from 


*  Glories  of  Mary,  pp.  271, 272,  660. 

t  Glories  of  Mary,  Protest  of  the  Author,  p.  4. 


86  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

mortal  sin,  or  if  lie  has  been,  that  he 
will  riot  relapse  into  it  and  die  in  it;  and 
in  either  case  indulgences  will  do  him  no 
good.  He  will  go  down  quick  into  hell,  and 
not  get  his  money  back  either.  But,  sup- 
posing him  to  have  escaped  eternal  perdi- 
tion, it  will  be  well  worth  while  to  have 
secured  indulgences — which  may  be  had  of 
assorted  lengths,  from  twenty-five  day  in- 
dulgences for  "  naming  reverently  the  name 
of  Jesus,  or  the  name  of  Mary,"  up  to 
twenty-five  thousand  and  thirty  thousand 
year  indulgences,  granted  for  weightier 
considerations.  But,  inasmuch  as  Dr.  Stone 
has  not  the  slightest  idea  how  many  mill- 
ions of  years  he  may  have  to  stay  in  pur- 
gatory, if  he  ever  has  the  happiness  to  get 
there,  it  will  be  best  for  him  to  go  in  for 
plenary  indulgences,  and  save  all  mistakes. 
There  are  various  ways  of  securing  them, 
and  it  may  well  employ  all  Dr.  Stone's  un- 
questionable talents  how  he  shall  get  the 
amplest  indulgence  at  the  least  cost  of 
time  and  labor.  On  a  superficial  examina- 
tion, we  are  disposed  to  think  that  there  is 
nothing  better  to  recommend  than  the  wear- 
ing of  scapulars. 

Says  St.  Alphonsus  de  Liguori :  "  The  in- 
dulgences that  are  attached  to  this  scapular 
of  our   Lady  of  Mt.  Carmel,  as  well  as  to 


BETTERED   HIS   SITUATION.  87 


the  others  of  the  Dolors  of  Mary,  of  Mary  of 
Mercy,  and  particularly  to  that  of  the  Con- 
ception, are  innumerable,  daily  and  plenary, 
in  life  and  at  the  article  of  death.  For  my- 
self, I  have  taken  all  the  above  scapulars. 
And  let  it  be  particularly  made  known  that 
besides  many  particular  indulgences,  there 
are  annexed  to  the  scapular  of  the  Im- 
maculate Conception,  which  is  blessed  by 
the  Theatine  Fathers,  all  the  indulgences 
which  are  granted  to  any  religious  order, 
pious  place  or  person.  And  particularly  by 
reciting  <  Our  Father,'  <  Hail  Mary,'  and 
<  Glory  be  to  the  Father,'  six  times  in 
honor  of  the  most  holy  Trinity  and  of  the 
immaculate  Mary,  are  gained  each  time 
all  the  indulgences  of  Rome,  Portiuncula, 
Jerusalem,  Gallicia,  which  reach  the  number 
of  four  hundred  and  thirty-three  plenary 
indulgences,  besides  the  temporal,  wThich 
are  innumerable.  All  this  is  transcribed 
from  a  sheet  printed  by  the  same  Theatine 
Fathers."*  Oh,  if  the  Theatine  Fathers 
were  only  infallible,  or  if  we  could  be  sure 
that  indulgences  were  absolute,  and  not 
conditional  upon  sundry  uncertainties,  how 
happy  we  might  be.  But  a  great  theologian, 
afterwards    a    Pope,f    declared  that  "the 

*  Glories  of  Mary,  p.  6G1. 

t  Pope  Adrian  VI.,  Comm.  on  the  Fourth  Book  of  The 
Sentences,  quoted  by  Bungener,  Council  of  Trent,  p.  4. 


88  HOW  THE  REV.    DR.   STONE 

effects  of  the  indulgence  purchased  or  ac- 
quired, are  not  absolute,  but   more   or  less 
good,  more  or  less  complete,  according  to 
the  dispositions    of   the   penitent  and  the 
manner  in  which  he  performs  the  work  to 
which  the  indulgence  is  attached."     And 
one  has  only  to  glance   through  the  pages 
of  some  theologian  like   Dr.  Peter    Dens, 
to   find  that    this    whole    doctrine  of    in- 
dulgences   is    so    contrived   as    to    be,  on 
the  one  hand,  indefinitely  corrupting  and 
depraving  to  the  common  crowd  of  sinners, 
and,  on   the  other  hand,  to  give  the  least 
possible  of  solid  comfort  to   fearful    con- 
sciences.   AVith  every  promise  of  remission 
that  the  Church  gives — for  a  consideration 
— she  reserves  to  herself  a  dozen  qualifica- 
tions and  evasions  which  make  it  of  none 
effect.* 

In  the  dismal  uncertainty  which  besets 
every  expedient  for  securing  one's  salvation 
which  we  have  thus  far  considered,  our 
friend  will  devote  himself  in  sheer  desjDera- 
tion   to  works  of  mortification,  which  are 

*Dens,  Tractat,  de  Indul?.,  34,  37,  38,  39,  et  passim. 
Says  Cardinal  Wiseman:  "For  you,  my  Catholic  breth- 
ren, know  that  without  a  penitent  confession  of  your 
sins  and  a  worthy  participation  of  the  blessed  Eucharist, 
no  indulgence  is  anything'  worth."  Doctrines  of  the 
Church.  Vol.  ii.,  p.  76.  This,  however,  is  said  in  a  course 
of  lectures  designed  to  commend  the  doctrines  of  the 
Church  to  Protestants;  when  the  object  lias  been  to  com- 
fort the  devotee,  or  to  raise  revenue  for  the  Roman 
treasury,  the  tone  of  the  authorized  representatives  of 
the  Church  has  sometimes  been  far  more  assuring:. 


BETTE&ED   HIS  SITUATION.  89 

alleged  by  his  advisers  to  have  a  good 
tendency  to  "appease  the  wrath  of  God." 
Fastings  and  abstinences  are  good;  but  a 
hair  shirt  is  far  more  effective,  if  his  skin  is 
tender;  and  we  cannot  doubt  that  flagella- 
tion is  more  serviceable  than  either.  A  good 
scourge  is  not  expensive,  but  it  should  have 
bits  of  wire  in  the  lashes,  for  a  more  rapid 
diminution  of  purgatorial  pains.  Sundry 
contrivances  applied  to  one's  bed,  or  to  the 
sole  of  one's  shoes,  are  recommended  by 
the  experience  of  some  eminent  saints 
as  of  great  efficacy  in  securing  one  against 
future  torment.  It  would  not  be  well  for 
Dr.  Stone,  in  his  quest  for  assurance,  to 
omit  any  of  them.  But,  alas !  when  he  has 
done  all,  he  is  in  the  same  dreary,  dismal 
darkness  as  before. 

Through  such  dim  and  doubtful  ways 
the  poor  Doctor  treads,  halting  and  hesi- 
tating, till  he  comes  towards  the  end  of  this 
weary  life.  Of  all  his  friends  who  have 
departed  this  life  before  him,  he  has  no 
confident  assurance  that  they  are  not  in 
hell;  but  he  cherishes  a  hope  that  they  may 
be  roasting  in  the  fires  of  purgatory,  though 
he  is  aware  that  there  is  even  a  faint 
chance  that  they  may  be  in  heaven;  but  he 
pays  for  daily  masses  and  indulgences  in 
their  behalf,  being  assured  by  the  theolo- 


90  HOW   THE  REV.    DR.    STONE 

gians  that  if  these  do  not  help  his  friends, 
they  may  in  all  probability  be  of  service 
to  some  one  else.*  The  nearest  to  certainty 
that  he  comes  on  any  such  question  is  in  the 
belief  that  his  godly  parents  and  friends 
that  have  lived  and  died  in  simple  faith  on 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  are  suffering  ever- 
lasting damnation — and  even  this  is  doubt- 
ful. As  the  hour  of  death  draws  near  he 
feels  for  his  various  scapulars,  and  finds 
them  right;  he  sends  for  his  confessor,  and 
makes  one  more  confession,  which  is  sub- 
ject to  all  the  doubtful  conditions  of  those 
that  have  gone  before;  receives  once  more 
an  absolution,  which  is  absolute  in  its 
terms,  but  conditional  in  its  meaning;  and 
receives  the  half  of  a  eucharist,  the  ef- 
ficiency of  which  depends  on  an  uncertain 
combination  of  conditions  in  his  own  soul 
and  history,  complicated  with  an  utterly 
unascertainable  series  of  facts  in  the  hidden 
intention  of  every  one  of  a  series  of  priests 
and  bishops  back  to  Simon  Peter  himself. 
This  done,  the  Church  aj>proaches  him  with 
a  final  sacrament,  which  promises  once 
more  to  do  what  it  thereby  acknowledges 
that  the  other  sacraments  have  failed  to 
accomplish — to  "wipe  away  offences,  if 
any  remain,  and  the  remains  of  sin  " — to 
"confer  grace  and  remit  sins."f 

*  Dens,  Tract,  de  Indulg.,  No.  40. 
fConc.  Trid.  Sess.  xiv.,  Can.  2. 


BETTERED   HIS   SITUATION.  91 

But  it  is  entirely  unsettled  among  theo- 
logians what  this  promise  means.  It  can- 
not be  the  remitting  of  mortal  sin,  for  if 
the  penitent  have  any  such  unforgiven,  he 
is  not  allowed  to  receive  the  unction;  and 
it  cannot  refer  to  venial  sins,  for  a  good 
many  reasons  that  are  laid  down;  and  it 
cannot  mean  "  proneness  or  habit  left  from 
past  sin,"  for  "it  often  happens  that  they 
who  recover  after  the  sacrament  feel  the 
same  proneness  to  sin  as  before."  *  In  fact, 
at  the  conclusion  of  the  sacrament  Dr. 
Stone  will  send  for  his  lawyer,  and  if  any- 
thing remains  of  his  property  after  his 
heavy  expenditure  in  masses  and  indul- 
gences for  the  benefit  of  his  deceased 
friends,  he  will  leave  it  by  will,  to  be  given 
for  masses  to  shorten  up  the  torments  which 
after  all  these  labors  and  prayers  to  Mary, 
and  mortifications,  and  sacraments,  he  still 
perceives  to  be  inevitable  f  But,  even  in 
this  he  bethinks  himself  of  the  uncertainty 
whether  masses,  paid  for  in  advance,  will 

♦Bellarmine,  de  Extr.  Unct.  i.,9,  T.  ii.,  p.  1198,9.  Quoted 
in  Pusey's  Eirenicon,  209-211. 

t  A  most  striking  instance  of  this  is  recorded  in  one  of 
the  most  interesting  and  recent  records  of  Roman 
Catholic  piety— the  Life  of  the  Cure-  d'Ars.  The  old  Cure- 
of  Ars  had  lived  a  life  of  preeminent  holiness,  in  which 
his  acts  of  self-mortification  had  been  so  austere  and 
cruel  as  to  have  broken  down  his  health— such  that 
others  could  not  hear  them  described  without  a  shudder. 
As  his  death  drew  near  he  "desired  to  be  fortified  by 
the  grace  of  the  last  sacrament "  ;  and  the  Abbe  Vianney 


92  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

ever  be  actually  said  or  sung.*  But,  poor 
soul,  it  is  the  best  he  can  do,  and  so  he  gets 
them  to  give  him  a  blessed  taper  to  hold, 
and  gives  up  the  ghost  while  it  burns  out, 
and  they  sprinkle  his  body  with  holy  water, 
and  bury  it  in  consecrated  ground  to  keep  it 
safe  from  the  demons;  and  his  children  give 
their  money  to  get  him  out  of  purgatory 
(in  case  he  is  there),  and  down  to  the  latest 
generation  never  know  (unless  their  money 
gives  out)  whether  they  have  succeeded, 
or  whether,  in  fact,  he  has  not  all  the  while 
been  hopelessly  in  hell  along  with  his  good 
old  father  and  mother. 

We  cannot  better  wind  up  this  exhibi- 
tion of  the  way  in  which  the  Church  of 
Rome  fulfils  her  promise  of  giving  as- 
surance of  salvation,  than  by  quoting  the 

then  heard  his  confession,  aud  administered  to  him  the  last 
rites  of  the  Church.  ..."  The  following  day  the  Abbe 
Vianney  celebrated  a  mass  for  his  revered  master,  at 
which  all  the  villagers  were  present.  When  this  service 
was  concluded,  M.  Bailey  requested  a  private  interview 
with  his  vicar.  During  this  last  and  solemn  conversation, 
the  dying  man  placed  in  his  bands  the  instruments  of  his 
penitence  (scourges,  etc.).  'Take  care,  my  poor  Vianney,1 
he  said,  4to  hide  these  things;  if  they  find  them  after  my 
death  they  will  think  I  have  done  something  during  my 
life  for  the  expiation  of  my  sins,  and  they  will  leave  me 
in  purgatory  to  the  end  of  the  world.'  "  The  Cure  d'Ars. 
A  Memoir  of  Jean-Baptiste-Marie  Vianney.  By  Georgina 
Molyneux.     London,  1869. 

♦There  will  hardly  fail  to  occur  to  him  the  scan- 
dalous cause  c61ebre  tried  some  years  since  in  Paris— 
the  case  of  a  large  brokerage  in  masses  for  the  dead, 
which  undertook  to  get  the  masses  performed  by  country 
priests  at  a  lower  figure  than  the  ruling  city  prices,  but 
was  detected  in  retaining  the  money  without  securing  the 
saying  of  the  masses  at  all. 


BETTERED   HIS  SITUATION.  93 

language  of  a  most  competent  witness,  the 
Rev.  J.  Blanco  White,  once  a  Roman 
Catholic  theologian  in  high  standing  in 
Spain,  afterwards  a  Protestant,  whose 
trustworthiness  is  vouched  for  by  Father 
Newman,  from  intimate  personal  acquaint- 
ance.*    Mr.  White  says: 

"The  Catholic  who  iirruly  believes  in 
the  absolving  power  of  his  Church,  and 
never  indulges  in  thought,  easily  allays  all 
fears  connected  with  the  invisible  world. 
Is  there  a  priest  at  hand  to  bestow  abso- 
lution at  the  last  moment  of  life,  he  is  sure 
of  a  place  in  heaven,  however  sharp  the 
burnings  may  be  which  are  appointed  for 
him  in  purgatory. 

"But,  alas  for  the  sensitive,  the  con- 
sistent, the  delicate  mind  that  takes  the 
infallible  church  for  its  refuge  !  That 
church  offers,  indeed,  certainty  in  every- 
thing that  concerns  our  souls;  but,  Thou, 
God,  who  hast  witnessed  my  misery  and 
that  of  my  nearest  relations — my  mother 
and  my  two  sisters — knowest  that  the 
promised  certainty  is  a  bitter  mockery. 
The  Catholic  pledges  of  spiritual  safety 
are  the  most  agonizing  sources  of  doubt. 

*"I  have  the  fullest  confidence  in  his  word  when 
he  witnesses  to  facts,  and  facts  which  he  knew."  He 
was  one  "  who  had  special  means  of  knowing  a  Catholic 
country,  and  a  man  you  can  trust."  Lectures  on  the 
Present  Position  of  Catholics  in  England,  by  John  Henry 
Newman,  D.D.   1851, 


94  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.    STONE 

"The  sacraments  intended  for  pardon 
of  sins  could  not  (according  to  the  common 
notions)  fail  in  producing  the  desired 
effect.  For  if,  as  was  subsequently  given 
out,  all  those  divinely  instituted  rites  de- 
manded such  a  spiritual  state  in  the  re- 
cipient as,  without  any  external  addition, 
would  produce  the  desired  effect,  what 
advantage  would  be  offered  to  the  believ- 
er? If  absolution  demanded  true  repent- 
ance to  deliver  from  sin,  this  was  leaving 
the  sinner  in  the  same  condition  as  he  was 
in  before  even  the  name  of  the  pretended 
Sacrament  of  Penance  was  heard  of  in  the 
world.  But,  if  these  conditions  alone  can 
give  security,  no  thinking  person,  and  es- 
pecially no  anxious,  timid  person,  can  find 
certainty  in  the  use  of  the  Sacraments. 
And  none  but  the  naturally  bold  and  con- 
fident do  find  it.  To  these  the  Sacraments, 
instead  of  being  means  of  virtue,  are 
encouragements  of  vice  and  iniquity. 

"  O  God !  if  Thou  couldst  hate  anything 
Thou  hast  made,  what  weight  of  indigna- 
tion would  have  fallen  upon  a  Constantine 
and  an  Alva!  And  yet  the  former,  having 
put  off  baptism  till  the  last  opportunity 
of  sinning  should  be  on  the  point  of  van- 
ishing with  the  last  breath  of  life,  declares 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  95 

the  heavenly  happiness  which  filled  his 
soul  from  the  moment  he  came  out  of  the 
baptismal  water;  the  latter,  that  cold- 
blooded butcher  of  thousands,  declares 
that  he  dies  without  the  least  remorse.  On 
the  other  hand,  have  I  not  seen  the  most 
innocent  among  Thy  worshippers  live  and 
die  in  a  maddening  fear  of  hell !  They 
tremble  at  the  Sacraments  themselves,  lest, 
from  want  of  a  firm  preparation,  they 
should  increase  their  spiritual  danger."* 

It  might  be  very  tedious  to  read,  but  it 
would  certainly  be  very  easy  to  present, 
like  proofs  to  show  that  in  "heeding  the 
invitation  "  of  the  Pope  to  come  to  him  for 
infallible  teaching  in  matters  of  beliefs  Dr. 
Stone  has  come  only  to  like  grief  and 
anxious  uncertainty.  He  has  stated  very 
neatly  the  fallacy  of  those  who  have  sought 
for  an  infallible  interpreter  of  scripture  in 
the  writings  of  the  Fathers.  "  They  do  not 
see  that  in  place  of  acting  upon  a  new  rule, 
they  have  only  increased  the  difficulties  of 
the  old;  that  instead  of  obtaining  an  in- 
terpreter, they  have  only  multiplied  the 
number  of  the  documents,  which  they 
must  themselves  interpret,  or  have  inter- 
preted for  them";  and  "are,  in  fact,  re- 

*  Life  of  the  Rev.  Joseph  Blanco  White,  written  by  him- 
self. Edited  by  John  Hamilton  Thorn.  London,  1845. 
Vol.  III.,  pp.  256-258. 


96  HOW  THE  REV.    DR.   STONE 

sorting  to  what  has  been  aptly  called  'the 
most  ingenious  of  all  Protestant  contri- 
vances for  submitting  to  nothing  and  no- 
body.' "*  Marvellous!  that  a  man  wlio  is 
so  shrewd  to  perceive  this  fallacy  in  the 
system  he  has  just  left,  should  be  so  blind 
to  the  same  fallacy  in  the  system  he  has 
just  adopted!     He  had 

"  Jumped  into  a  bramble  bush 
And  scratched  out  both  his  eyes; 

"  And  when  he  saw  his  eyes  were  out, 
With  all  his  might  and  main, 
He  jumped  into  another  bush 
To  scratch  them  in  again." 

By  just  so  far  as  his  new  teacher  is  in- 
fallible, it  is  sinij)ly  documentary — paper 
and  printer's  ink — Fathers,  Councils,  Bulls, 
Briefs,  more  Bulls,  more  Briefs,  and  an- 
other Council  again,  documents  upon  docu- 
ments, all  in  the  Latin  tongue  (which, 
happily,  Dr.  Stone  is  able  to  read),  until 
the  world  cannot  hold  the  books  that 
have  been  written.  But,  on  the  other  hand, 
just  as  far  as  he  has  access  to  his  new 
teacher  as  a  living  teacher — a  representa- 
tive of  the  Catholic  hierarchy — he  finds 
him  confessedly  fallible — an  uninspired 
priest  or  bishop,  likely  enough  an  un- 
convicted heretic,  and  at  least  liable  to 
all  human  blunders   and  endless    "varia- 

*The  Invitation  Heeded,  pp.  158, 159. 


BETTERED   HIS  SITUATION.  97 

tions "  in  expounding  and  applying  the 
faith  of  the  Church.  If,  disgusted  with 
these  miserable  comforters,  he  carries  his 
doubts  to  the  apostolic  threshold,  and  re- 
ceives a  solution  of  them  from  the  succes- 
sor of  Peter  himself,  it  is  a  poor  reward 
for  his  pilgrimage,  when  he  learns  that  the 
words  of  the  pontiff  spoken  in  his  capacity 
as  a  private  teacher  are  no  more  infallible 
than  those  of  any  Protestant  minister.  So 
that  the  certainty  of  poor  Dr.  Stone's  faith, 
unless  he  chooses  the  alternate  risk  of  going 
to  the  documents  himself,  and  taking  his 
chance  of  being  "  saved  by  scholarship," 
or  by  "private  interpretation," is  resolved 
into  the  mere  "  fides  implicita  " — of  being 
willing  to  believe  the  truth  if  he  only 
knew  what  it  was — and  that,  if  we  under- 
stand him,  is  just  what  he  had  before  he 
got  the  Pope's  letter,  with  the  exception 
that  at  that  time  there  were  fewer  elements 
of  uncertainty  in  his  mind. 

And  just  as  with  questions  of  truth,  so 
is  it  with  questions  of  duty.  In  search  of 
definiteness  and  certainty  he  has  gone  voy- 
aging upon  a  waste  of  dreary  casuistry, 
upon  whose  fluctuating  surface  he  lies  be- 
calmed, tossed  to  and  fro  between  "  proba- 
bilism  "  and  "  probabiliorism,"  and  oh,  Iioav 
seasick!     There  is  nothing  for    him   but 


98  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

to  "do  as  they  do  in  Spain  " ;  and  how  that 
is  we  learn  from  Father  Newman's  friend, 
Blanco  White: 

"  In  a  country  where  every  person's  con- 
science is  in  the  keeping  of  another,  in  an 
interminable  succession  of  moral  trusts, 
the  individual  conscience  cannot  be  under 
the  steady  discipline  of  self-governing  prin- 
ciple; all  that  is  practised  is  obedience  to 
the  opinion  of  others,  and  even  that  obedi- 
ence is  inseparably  connected  with  the 
idea  of  a  dispensing  power.  If  you  can 
obtain  an  opinion  favorable  to  your  wishes, 
the  responsibility  falls  on  the  adviser,  and 
you  may  enjoy  yourself  with  safety.  The 
adviser,  on  the  other  hand,  having  no  con- 
sciousness of  the  action,  has  no  sense  of 
remorse;  and  thus  the  whole  morality  of 
the  country,  except  in  very  peculiar  cases, 
wants  the  steady  ground  of  individual  re- 
sponsibility."* 

The  sum  of  the  whole  matter  seems  to 
be  this,  that  the  certainty  and  confidence 
of  the  disciple  of  the  Church  of  Rome, 
whether  regarding  matter  of  belief  or 
matter  of  practice,  consists  in  putting  his 
head  in  a  bag  and  giving  the  string  to  his 
confessor. 

The  "  invitation  heeded  "  by  Dr.  Stone 

♦Life  of  J.  Blanco  White,  I.,  p.  33. 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  99 

contains  other  seductive  promises,  which  it 
would  be  well  for  us  to  consider  if  there 
were  time.  We  can  only  allude  with  a 
word  to  the  excellent  things  which  His 
Holiness  offers,  in  this  invitation,  to  society 
and  government  in  Protestant  countries, 
in  pity  of  the  misfortunes  under  which  he 
perceives  them  now  to  be  suffering. 

"Whoever  recognizes  religion  as  the 
foundation  of  human  society,  cannot  but 
perceive  and  acknowledge  what  disastrous 
effect  this  division  of  principles,  this  oppo- 
sition, this  strife  of  religious  sects  among 
themselves,  has  had  upon  civil  society,  and 
how  powerfully  this  denial  of  the  authority 
established  by  God  to  determine  the  belief 
of  the  human  mind,  and  to  direct  the 
actions  of  men  as  well  in  private  as  in 
social  life,  has  excited,  spread,  and  fostered 
those  deplorable  upheavals,  those  commo- 
tions by  which  almost  all  people  are  griev- 
ously disturbed  and  afflicted."  "  On  this 
longed-for  return  to  the  truth  and  unity 
of  the  Catholic  Church  depends  the  salva- 
tion not  only  of  individuals,  but  also  of  all 
Christian  society;  and  never  can  the  world 
enjoy  true  peace  unless  there  shall  be  one 
fold  and  one  Shepherd."* 

We  see   here  the  value  of  an  infallible 

*  Letter  of  Pope  Pius  IX.,  Sept.  13, 1868. 


100  HOW  THE  REV.   DK.    STONE 

teacher!  If  it  had  not  been  revealed  to  us 
thus  from  heaven,  we  never  should  have 
guessed  that  what  secured  national  tran- 
quillity was  national  adherence  to  the  Holy 
See.  But  now  we  see  it — by  the  eye  of  faith. 
Poor  England,  racked  with  intestine  com- 
motions ! — if  she  could  but  learn  the  secret 
of  Spanish  order  and  tranquillity  and  pros- 
perity !  Unhappy  Scotland,  the  prey  of 
social  anarch v,  and  devoured  bv  thriftless 
indolence  !  will  she  not  cast  one  glance 
across  the  sea,  and  lay  to  heart  the  lesson 
of  Irish  serenity  and  peace  and  wealth  ? 
Poor  Protestant  Prussia,  and  Denmark,  and 
Scandinavia,  "grievously  disturbed  and 
afflicted"  by  "those  deplorable  upheavals 
and  commotions  "  which  His  Holiness  talks 
about,  and  yet  so  pitifully  unconscious  of 
them  all  !  How  slight  the  price — a  mere 
"Fall  down  and  worship  me  " — with  which 
they  might  purchase  to  themselves  the 
sweet  calmness  and  good  order  and  un- 
broken quiet  that  have  characterized  the 
history  of  Catholic  France  and  Italy,  and 
even  the  ineffable  beatitude  of  those  happy 
States  of  the  Church,  which,  ungrateful 
for  their  unparalleled  blessings,  were  wait- 
ing at  that  very  time  for  a  good  chance 
to  put  the  Pope  (in  his  temporal  capacity) 
into   the   Tiber  !     Nav,  nav  !     Let  us  not 


Bettered  his  situation.  101 


refuse  to  bring  home  the  teaching  of  our 
Shepherd  to  our  own  bosoms.  What  land 
has  been  more  the  victim  of  "  this  divi- 
sion of  principles,  this  opposition,  this 
strife  of  religious  sects  among  them- 
selves," than  our  own  unhappy  country? 
Ah  !  were  the  people  wise  !  Do  they  not 
feel  the  "  disastrous  effects  "  of  their  re- 
fusal to  submit  to  the  Holy  See — the 
"  deplorable  upheavals,  and  commotions," 
and  all  ?  Can  they  resist  the  allurements 
of  those  examples  of  national  happiness 
which  fill  the  whole  western  hemisphere, 
save  the  two  pitiable  exceptions  of  Canada 
and  the  United  States  ?  Speak,  dear  Dr. 
Stone,  speak  once  more  to  your  infatuated 
fellow-countrymen,  and  persuade  them,  if 
you  can,  to  end  this  hundred  years'  history 
of  commotion  and  revolution  and  dis- 
astrous change  which  they  have  lately 
completed,  by  substituting  the  majestic 
stability  of  Mexico,  and  Guatemala,  and 
Colombia,  and  all  the  Catholic  continent 
down  to  the  Straits  of  Magellan  !  *     Al- 

*  Father  Hyacin the  does  not  seem  to  come  up  to  the 
standard  of  Roman  doctrine  on  this  point.  "Ah,  well, 
I  know— and  many  a  time  have  I  groaned  within  my- 
self to  think  of  it— these  nations  of  the  Latin  race  and 
of  the  Catholic  religion  have  been  of  late  the  most 
grievously  tried  of  all  I  Not  only  by  intestine  fires,  by  the 
quaking  of  the  earth,  by  the  inrushing  of  the  sea.  Look 
with  impartial  eve,  with  the  fearless  serenity  of  truth, 
with  that  assurance  of  faith  which  fears  not  to  accept  the 
revelations  of  experience,  and  then  tell  me  where  it  is 
that  the  moral  foundations  quake  most  violently  ?  Where 


102  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.    STONE 

ready  a  ray  of  hope  shines  in  upon  the  dark- 
ness of  the  Protestant  land.  One  bright 
spot  is  irradiated  with  the  triumph — the 
partial  triumph — of  Roman  principles  of 
government.  Can  it  be  irrational  to  hope 
that  when  these  principles  prevail  in  the 
same  degree  throughout  the  land,  we  shall 
have  everywhere,  under  state  and  general 
governments,  the  same  placid  order,  the 
same  security  for  life  and  property,  the 
same  freedom  from  turbulence  and  riot,  the 
same  purity  of  elections,  the  same  integ- 
rity in  the  discharge  of  public  trusts,  the 
same  awf  illness  of  judicial  virtue  as  pre- 
vail in  the  Catholic  city  and  county  of 
New  York? 

We  have  left  ourselves  very  little  space 
to  express  as  we  would  like  the  real  respect 
which,  after  all,  we  feel  for  this  book,  and 
still  more  for  its  author.  With  here  and 
there  a  slip  in  grammar  or  diction,  and 
with  no  more  of  pedantry  than  can  easily 
be  pardoned  to  the  author's  vocation, 
the  work  is  elegantly  written;  and  if  there 
does  seem  to   be  a  dreadful  gap  between 

does  the  current  of  a  formidable  electricity  give  the 
severest,  the  most  incessant  shocks  to  republics  as 
well  as  monarchies?  Among  the  Latin  races,  among  the 
Catholic  nations.  Yes,  by  some  inscrutable  design  of 
Providence,  they,  more  than  others,  have  had  to  '  drink 
of  the  cup  deep  and  large';  they  have  wet  their  lips  more 
deeply  in  the  chalice  in  which  are  mingled  '  the  wine,  the 
1  ightuing,  and  the  spirit  of  the  storm  ' ;  and  they  have  be- 
come possessed  with  the  madness  of  the  drunkard.1'  Dis- 
courses of  Father  Hyacinthe,  Vol.  I.,  p.  155. 


BETTERED  HIS  SITUATION.  103 


what  the  author  intended  when  he  started, 
and  what  he    found    where  he  stopped,  it 
must  be  acknowledged  that  he  passes  from 
starting  point  to  goal  with  consecutive  steps 
along  an  intelligible  path.     His  argument, 
although   encumbered    with    mistakes,  is, 
nevertheless,    good  against   any  opponent 
who  accepts  his  premise — that  the  Church 
Universal   is    a    visible    corporation.     His 
appeal  to  all  Protestants  to  examine  with 
candor  the   grounds    of   their   belief,   and 
bravely   and   sincerely  accept    the   conse- 
quences, is  earnest,   tender  and  touching- 
all  the  more  so,    as  the  unhappy  author  in 
his  very  exhortation,    evidently  looks  back 
upon   those   generous   moments   when   he 
himself    was    practising  these  virtues,    as 
Adam  might  have  looked  back  upon  Para- 
dise.  Those  hours  can  never  return.  Never 
more   may   he  exercise  the   manly   virtue 
which  he   now  commends   to   others,   and 
which  we  doubt  not  he  faithfully  practised 
until  it  became  a  prohibited   good.       Let 
him  now  attempt  to  look  into  the  writings 
of  those  who  differ  from  him,  with  a  view 
to  "examining  candidly  the  grounds  of  his 
faith,"'  and  the  thunderbolt  of  the  excom- 
munication   lake    sentential    breaks   forth 
upon  him  from  the  Bull  In  Coena  Domini* 

*  Ligorii  Theol.  Moral,  63,  735. 


104  HOW  THE  REV.   DR.   STONE 

We  are  so  affected  by  the  honest  doctor's 
exhortation  to  candid  inquiry,  that  we 
shrink  from  putting  ourselves,  like  him,  in 
a  situation  in  which  if  we  candidly  inquire 
we  are  damned. 

The  little  volume  will  reasonably  be  ex- 
pected to  be  more  effective  as  a  fact  and  a 
testimony  than  as  an  argument.  As  a  tes- 
timony, its  precise  value  is  this  :  Until 
middle  life,  the  author,  believing  him- 
self to  be  entirely  sincere  and  candid,  held, 
as  the  result  of  private  judgment,  a  system 
(according  to  his  own  statement)  wildly 
inconsistent,  illogical  and  self-destructive, 
which  he  vindicated  to  himself  and  others 
by  arguments  plausible  and  satisfactory. 
In  the  course  of  a  few  months,  after  can- 
did but  brief  examination,  in  the  exercise 
of  the  same  private  judgment,  he  dropped 
that  system  and  (also  with  entire  sincerity) 
adopted  another,  sustained  by  plausible 
arguments  which  he  is  not  permitted  can- 
didly to  re-examine.  It  is  solely  by  the 
use  of  the  same  private  judgment  that 
played  him  so  false  before,  that  he  has 
come  to  embrace  this  other  svstem. 

Qu.: — What  is  the  probability  that  he 
has  got  the  truth  now  ? 

That  is  what  he  may  never  know. 

One  thing  alone  he  holds  intelligently — 


BETTERED   HIS   SITUATION.  105 


that  the  Roman  Church  is  the  true  church 
of  Christ;  and  this  he  knows  only  by  his 
poor  private  judgment,  which  he  is  not 
permitted  to  revise.  Everything  else  he 
takes  on  the  authority  of  this.  And  this, 
being  known  only  by  private  judgment, 
may  be  a  mistake  ! 
Poor  man  ! 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON 


THE  REAL  PRISONER 
OF  CHILLON. 


"A  character  more  celebrated  than 
known  "  is  Francis  Bonivard,  prior  of  St. 
Victor  and  Prisoner  of  Chillon.  It  is  not 
by  any  intentional  imposture  on  his  part 
that  he  goes  stalking  through  modern  liter- 
ature disguised  in  the  character  of  hero, 
saint  and  martyr,  and  shouting  in  a  hoarse 
chest-voice  his  "appeal  from  tyranny  to 
God."  In  fact,  if  he  could  be  permitted 
to  revisit  his  cherished  little  shelf  of  books 
about  which  has  grown  the  ample  library 
of  the  University  of  Geneva,  and  view  the 
various  delineations  of  himself  by  artist, 
poet,  and  even  serious  historian,  it  would 
be  delightful  to  witness  his  comical  aston- 
ishment. Perhaps  it  is  not  to  be  laid  to 
the  fault  of  Lord  Byron,  who  after  visiting 
the  old  castle  and  its  dungeon  beguiled  the 
hours  of  a  rainy  day  at  the  inn  at  Ouchy 
with  writing  a  poem  concerning  which  he 
frankly  confesses  that  he  had  not  the 
slightest  knowledge  of  its  hero.  Hobhouse, 
his  companion,  ought  to  have  been  better 
informed,   but  was   not.      If    anybody  is 


110  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OP  CHILLON. 

to  blame,  it  is  the  recent  writers,  who  do 
know  the  facts,  but  are  unwilling  to  hurt 
so  fine  an  heroic  figure  or  to  dethrone  "one 
of  the  demigods  of  the  liberal  mythology." 
Enough  to  say  that  the  Muse  of  History 
has  been  guilty  of  one  of  those  practical 
jokes  to  which  she  is  too  much  addicted,  in 
dressing  with  tragic  buskins  and  muffling 
in  the  cloak  of  a  hero  of  melodrama,  and 
so  palming  off  for  earnest  on  two  genera- 
tions of  mankind,  the  drollest  wag  of  the 
sixteenth  century. 

A  wild  young  fellow  like  Bonivard,  with 
a  lively  appreciation  of  the  ridiculous, 
could  not  fail  to  see  the  comic  aspect  of  the 
fate  which  invested  him  with  the  spiritual 
and  temporal  authority  and  emoluments  of 
the  priory  of  St.  Victor.  This  was  a  rich 
little  Benedictine  monastery  just  outside 
the  eastern  gate  of  Geneva,  on  the  little 
knoll  now  crowned  by  the  observatory, 
surrounded  with  walls  and  moat  of  its  own, 
independent  of  the  Bishop  of  Geneva  in 
spiritual  matters,  and  in  temporal  affairs 
equally  independent  of  the  city:  in  fact,  it 
was  a  petty  sovereignty  by  itself,  and  its 
dozen  of  hearty,  well-provided  monks, 
though  nominally  under  the  rule  of  Cluny, 
were  a  law  to  themselves,  and  not  a  very 
rigid  one  either.     The  office  of  prior,  by 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF   CHILLON.  Ill 


virtue  of  a  little  arrangement  at  Rome,  de- 
scended to  Bonivard  from  his  uncle,  im- 
mediately upon  whose  demise  the  young 
potentate  of  twenty-one  took  upon  him  the 
state  and  functions  of  his  office  in  a  way  to 
show  the  monks  of  St.  Victor  that  they 
had  no  King  Log  to  deal  with.  The  doc- 
ument is  still  extant  in  the  Latin  of  the 
period,  in  which  Prior  Bonivard  ordains 
that  every  new  brother  at  his  initiation 
shall  not  only  stand  treat  all  round,  but 
shall,  at  his  own  cost  and  charges,  furnish 
every  one  of  his  brethren  with  a  new  cap. 
Another  document  of  equal  gravity  makes 
new  ordinances  concerning  the  convent- 
kitchen,  which  seems  to  have  been  one  of 
the  good  prior's  most  religious  cares.*  Not 
only  his  own  subjects,  but  those  of  other 
jurisdictions,  were  made  to  feel  the  majesty 
of  his  sovereign  authority.  He  would  let 
them  know  that  he  had  "just  as  much 
jurisdiction  at  St.  Victor  as  the  Duke  of 
Savoy  had  at  Chambery."  He  heard  causes, 
sentenced  to  prison,  even  received  ambas- 
sadors from  his  brother  the  duke,  but  not 
without  looking  sharply  at  their  credentials. 
If  these  were  wanting,  the  unfortunate 
wretches  were  threatened  with  the  gallows 

*  The  documents  are  given  in  full  in  the  appendix  of  Dr. 
J  J  Chapponiere's  memoir  in  vol.  iv.  of  the  Mem.  de  la 
Soc.  Archeol.  de  Geneve.  The  former  ia  signed  by  Boni- 
vard, apostolic  prothonotary  and  poet-laureate. 


112  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OP  CHILLON. 

as  spies,  and  when  they  had  been  thorough- 
ly frightened  the  monarch  would  indulge 
himself  in  the  exercise  of  the  sweetest  pre- 
rogative of  roj^alty,  the  pardoning  power, 
and,  when  it  was  considered  that  the  maj- 
esty of  the  state  had  been  sufficiently  as- 
serted, would  wind  up  with  asking  the 
whole  company  to  dinner. 

It  had  been  considered  a  clever  stroke  of 
policy,  at  a  time  when  the  dukes  of  Savoy 
and  the  bishops  of  Geneva,  who  agreed  in 
nothing  else,  were  plotting,  together  or 
separately,  to  capture  and  extinguish  the 
immemorial  liberties  of  the  brave  little  free 
city,  to  get  this  fortified  outpost  before  its 
very  gate  officered  by  a  brilliant  and  daring 
young  Savoyard  gentleman,  who  would  be 
bound  to  the  duke  by  his  nativity  and  to 
the  Church  by  his  office,  and  to  both  by  his 
interests.  To  the  dismay  of  bishop  and 
duke,  it  appeared  that  the  young  prior, 
who  had  led  a  gay  life  of  it  at  the  Uni- 
versity of  Turin,  had  nevertheless  read  his 
classics  to  some  purpose,  and  had  come 
back  with  his  head  full  of  Plato  and  Plu- 
tarch and  Livy  and  of  theories  of  republi- 
can liberty.  So  that  by  putting  him  into 
St.  Victor  they  had  turned  that  little 
stronghold  from  an  outpost  of  attack  upon 
Geneva  liberties   into   the  favorite  resort 


THE  REAL   PRISONER  OF  CHILLON.  113 

and  rendezvous  of  all  the  young  liberal 
leaders  of  that  gay  but  gallant  little  re- 
public, who  found  themselves  irresistibly 
drawn  to  young  Bonivard,  partly  as  a  re- 
publican and  still  more  as  a  jolly  good 
fellow. 

The  first  manifestation  of  his  sympathies 
in  that  direction  occurred  soon  after  his 
installation  as  prior.  His  uncle  on  his 
deathbed  had  confessed  to  young  Francis 
the  burden  on  his  conscience  in  that  he  had 
taken  Church  money  and  applied  it  to  the 
making  of  a  battery  of  culverins  wherewith 
to  levy  war  against  one  of  his  neighbors  in 
the  country;  and  bequeathed  to  his  nephew 
the  convent  and  the  culverins,  with  the 
charge  to  melt  down  the  latter  into  a  chime 
of  church-bells  which  should  atone  for  his 
evil  deeds.  Not  long  after,  Bonivard  was 
telling  the  story  to  his  friend,  Berthelier, 
the  daring  and  heroic  leader  of  the  "Sons 
of  Geneva "  in  their  perilous  struggle 
against  tyranny,  when  the  latter  exclaimed : 
"What!  spoil  good  cannon  to  make  bells ? 
Never!  Give  us  the  guns,  and  you  shall 
have  old  metal  to  make  bells  enough  to 
split  your  ears.  But  let  guns  be  guns.  So 
the  Church  will  be  doubly  served.  There 
will  be  chimes  at  St.  Victor  and  guns  in 
Geneva,  which    is   a    Church  city."     The 


114  THE  REAL   PRISONER  OP  CHILLON. 

bargain  was  struck,  as  a  vote  in  the  records 
of  the  city  council  shows  to  this  day.  But 
it  was  the  beginning  of  a  quarrel  with  the 
Duke  of  Savoy  which  was  to  cost  Bonivard 
more  than  he  had  counted  on.  There  was 
reckless  deviltry  enough  among  all  these 
young  liberals,  but  some  of  them  —  not 
Bonivard — were  capable  of  seriously  count- 
ing the  cost  of  their  game.  On  one  occasion 
— it  was  at  the  christening  of  Berthelier's 
child,  and  Bonivard  was  godfather — Ber- 
theliertook  his  friend  aside  from  the  guests 
and  said,  "It  is  time  we  had  done  with 
dancing  and  junketing  and  organized  for 
the  defence  of  liberty." — "All  right!" 
said  the  prior.  "Come  on,  and  may  the 
Lord  prosper  our  crazy  schemes!"  Ber- 
thelier  took  his  hand,  and  with  a  serious 
look  that  sobered  the  rattle-headed  eccle- 
siastic for  a  moment,  replied,  "  But  let  me 
warn  you  that  this  is  going  to  cost  you  your 
living  and  me  my  head." — "I  have  heard 
him  say  this  a  hundred  times,"  says  Boni- 
vard in  his  Chronicles.  The  dungeon  at 
Chillon  and  the  mural  tablet  in  the  Tour 
de  l'Isle  at  Geneva  tell  how  truly  the 
prophecy  was  fulfilled. 

There  was  so  little  of  the  strut  of  the 
stage-hero  about  Bonivard  that  he  could 
not  be  comfortable  in  doing  a  chivalrous 


THE  REAX.  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON.  115 


thing  without  a  joke  to  take  off  the  gloss 
of  it.     Before  the  ducal  party  had  quite 
given  up  hopes  of  him  there  was  a  serious 
affair  on  their  hands — the  need  of  putting 
out  of  the  way  by  such  means,  treacherous 
and  atrocious,  as  the  Savoyards  of  that  day 
loved  to  use,  one  of   the  noblest  of  the 
Geneva  magistrates,  Aime  Levrier.     An 
emissary  of  the  duke,  of  high  rank,  kins- 
man to  Bonivard,  came  to  St.  Victor  and 
offered  the  prior  magnificent  inducements 
to  aid  in  the  plot.     With  a  gravity  that 
must  have  convulsed  the  spectators  if  there 
had  been  any,  Bonivard  pointed  to  his  mo- 
nastic gown,  his  prayer-book  and  his  cru- 
cifix, and  pleaded  his  deep  sense  of  the  sa- 
credness  of  his  office  as  a  reason  for  having 
nothing  to  do  with   the   affair.     "  Then," 
says  his  kinsman,  rising  in  wrath,  "I  will 
do  the  business  myself.     I'll  have  Levrier 
out  of  his  bed  and  over  in  Savoy  this  very 
night." — "Do  you  really   mean  it,  uncle? 
Give  me  your  hand !  " — "  Then  you  consent, 
after  all,  to  help   me  in   the   matter?" — 
"  Oh  no,  uncle,  that  isn't  it.     But  I  know 
these  Genevese  are  a  hasty  sort  of  folk, 
and  I  am  just  going  to  raise  thirty  florins 
to  be  spent  in  saying  masses  to-morrow  for 
the  repose  of  your  soul."     Before  the  even- 
ing was  over,  Bonivard  found  an  oppor- 


116  THE  REAL  PRISONER   OF  CHILLON. 

timity  of  slipping  in  disguise  over  to  the 
house  of  Levrier  and  giving  a  hint  of  what 
was  intended:  the  notes  of  preparation  for 
resistance  that  Berthelier  and  his  friends 
began  at  once  to  make  wrought  upon  the 
excited  nerves  of  the  ambassador  and  his 
armed  retinue  to  such  a  point  that  they 
were  fain  to  escape  from  the  town  by  a  se- 
cret gate  before  daylight. 

The  affair  of  his  rescue  of  Pecolat  is  an- 
other illustration  of  his  character  and  of 
the  strange,  turbulent  age  in  which  he 
lived;  and  it  went  far  to  embitter  the 
hatred  of  the  duke  and  the  bishop  against 
him.  This  poor  fellow  was  the  jester, 
song-singer  and  epigrammatist  of  the  mad- 
cap patriots  who  were  associated  under  the 
title  of  "Sons  of  Geneva."  Under  a 
trumped-up  charge  of  plotting  the  death 
of  the  bishop  he  was  kidnapped  and  carried 
away  to  one  of  the  castles  in  the  neighbor- 
hood, and  there  tortured  until  a  false  con- 
fession was  wrung  from  him  implicating 
Berthelier  and  others.  To  secure  his  con- 
demnation to  death  he  was  brought  back 
into  the  city  and  presented  before  the  court; 
but  the  sight  of  the  poor  cripple,  racked 
and  bruised  with  recent  tortures,  and  his 
steadfastness  in  recanting  his  late  confes- 
sion, wrought  more  with  the  judges  than 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON.  117 

the  fear  of  the  duke,  and  he  was  acquitted. 
But  the  feeble  and  ferocious  bishop,  moved 
partly  by  malignity,  and  partly,  no  doubt, 
by  sincere  and  cowardly  terror,  was  re- 
solved to  kill  him;  and  by  some  fiction  de- 
claring him  to  have  been  in  the  minor 
orders,  he  clapped  him  into  the  bishop's 
prison,  claiming  to  try  him  by  ecclesiastical 
law.  The  story  of  renewed  tortures  in- 
flicted on  their  helpless  comrade,  and  their 
knowledge  of  the  certain  death  that  awaited 
him,  stirred  the  blood  of  the  patriots  of 
Geneva.  It  was  just  the  moment  for  the 
prior  of  St.  Victor  to  show  that  the  studies 
at  Freiburg  and  Turin  that  had  made  him 
doctor  utriusque  Juris  had  not  been  in 
vain.  He  would  fight  the  bishop  with  his 
own  weapon  of  Church  law.  He  despatched 
Pecolat's  own  brother  with  letters  to  the 
Archbishop  of  Vienne,  metropolitan  to  the 
Bishop  of  Geneva,  and,  using  his  family  in- 
fluence, which  was  not  small,  he  secured  a 
summons  to  the  bishop  and  chapter  of 
Geneva  to  appear  before  the  archiepiscopal 
court  and  give  account  of  the  affair,  and 
meanwhile  to  cease  all  proceedings  against 
the  prisoner. 

It  was  comparatively  easy  to  procure  the 
summons.  The  difficulty  was  to  find  some 
one  competent  to  the  functions  of  episcopal 


118  THE  REAL   PRISONER   OF   CHILLON. 

usher  and  bold  enough  to  serve  it.  Boni- 
vard  bethought  him  of  a  "  caitiff  wretch  " 
— an  obscure  priest — to  whom  he  handed 
the  document  with  two  round  dollars  lying 
on  it,  and  bade  him  hand  the  paper  to  the 
bishop  at  mass  the  next  day  in  the  cathedral. 
The  starving  clergyman  hesitated  long  be- 
tween his  fears  and  his  necessities,  but  finally 
promised  to  do  the  work  on  condition  that  the 
prior  should  stand  by  him  in  person  and  see 
him  through.  The  hour  approached,  and  the 
commissioner's  courage  was  oozing  rapidly 
away.  His  knees  knocked  together,  and  he 
slipped  back  in  the  crowd,  hoping  to  es- 
cape. The  vigilant  prior  darted  after  him, 
seized  him,  and  laying  his  hand  on  the  dag- 
ger that  he  wore  under  his  robe,  whispered 
in  his  ear,  "  Do  it  or  I'll  stab  you  !  "  He 
adds,  in  his  Chronicles,  "I  should  have 
been  as  good  as  my  word  :  I  do  not  say  it 
by  way  of  boasting.  I  know  I  was  acting 
like  a  fool,  but  I  was  quite  beside  myself 
with  anxiety  for  my  friend."  Happily, 
there  was  no  need  of  extreme  measures. 
He  gripped  his  terrified  victim  by  the  thumb, 
and  as  the  procession  moved  towards  the 
church-door  he  thrust  the  paper  into  his 
hand,  saying,  "  Now's  the  time  !  You've 
got  to  do  it."  And  all  the  time  he  held  him 
fast  by  the  thumb.    The  bishop  came  near, 


THE   REAL  PRISONER   OF  CHILLON.  119 


and  Bonivard  let  go  the  wretch's  thumb 
and  pushed  him  to  the  front,  pointing  to 
the  prelate  and  saying,  "  Do  your  work  !  " 
The  bishop  turned  pale  with  terror  of  assas- 
sination as  he  heard  the  words.     But  the 
trembling  clerk,  not  less  terrified  than  the 
bishop,  dropped  on  his  knees  and  presented 
the  archiepiscopal    mandate,  gasping  out, 
"My  lord,  inhibitor  vobisyprout  incopia." 
Bonivard  retreated  into  his  inviolable  sanc- 
tuary of  St.  Victor.    "I  was  young  enough 
and  crazy  enough,"  he  says,  "  to  fear  neither 
bishop  nor  duke."    He  had  saved  poor  Peco- 
lat's  life,  although  the  work  was  not  finished 
until  the  publication  of  an  interdict  from 
the  metropolitan  silencing  every   church- 
bell  and  extinguishing  every  altar-candle  in 
the  city  had  brought  the  bishop  to  terms.* 
It  is  a  hardship  to  the  writer  to  be  com- 
pelled to  retrench  the  story  of  the  early 
deeds  for  liberty  of  Bonivard  and  his  boon 
companions.    There  is  a  rollicking  swagger 
about  them  all,  which  by  and  by  begins  to 
be  sobered  when  it  is  seen  that  "ontheside 
of  the  oppressor  there  h power."  By  violence, 

an*/mt?£!Xis  t0}*  b/  £<>niyard  him«elf  in  his  Chronicles, 
MpH^aI-011'!1  m  f,u11  detail  in  the  Second  Series  of  Dr 
Merle  d  Aubigne's  volumes  on  the  Reformation,  vol    i 

?£f?h  Vm'  and  *•  4  -The  story  that  Pecolat,  about  to  be  sub^ 
nutted  a  second  time  to  the  torture,  and  fearing  lest  he 
might  be  again  tempted  to  accuse  his  friends,  attempted 
«L£?  °r^hlSm?wn  ^onoue  w»th  a  razor,  seems  to  be  au- 
mPSS$&'  The  whole  story  is  worthy  of  being  told  at 
full  length  in  English,  it  is  so  full  of  generous  heroism. 


120  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON. 


by  fraudulent  promises,  by  foul  treachery 
on  the  part  of  cowardly  citizens,  the  Duke 
of  Savoy  gains  admittance  with  his  army 
within  the  walls  of  Geneva,  and  begins  his 
delicious  and  bloody  revenge  for  the  indig- 
nities that  have  been  put  upon  his  preten- 
sions and  usurpations.  Berthelier,  a  very 
copy  from  the  antique  — a  hero  that  might 
have  stepped  forth  into  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury from  the  page  of  Plutarch  * — remained 
in  the  town  serenely  to  await  the  death 
which  he  foreknew.  On  the  day  of  the 
duke's  entrance  Bonivard,  who  had  no  such 
relish  for  martyrdom  for  its  own  sake,  put 
himself  between  two  of  his  most  trusted 
friends,  the  Lord  of  Voruz  and  the  Abbot  of 
Montheron  of  the  Pays  de  Vaud,  and  gal- 
loped away  disguised  as  a  monk.  "  Come 
first  to  my  convent,"  said  the  abbot,  "  and 
thence  we  will  take  you  to  a  place  of 
safety."  The  convent  was  reached,  and  in 
the  morning  Bonivard  was  greeted  by  his 
comrade  Voruz,  who  came  into  his  room, 
and,  laying  paper  and  pen  before  him,  re- 
quired him  to  write  a  renunciation  of  his 
priory  in  favor  of  the  Abbot  of  Montheron- 
Resistance  was  vain.  He  was  a  prisoner  in 
the  hands  of  traitors.  The  alternative  being 

*  "Je  n'ai  vu  ni  lu  oncques  un  si  grand  m^priseur  de 
mort,"  says  Bonivard  in  his  Chronicles. 


THE   REAL   PRISONER   OF   CHILLON.  121 


"  Your  priory  or  your  life  !  "  he  frankly 
owns  that  he  required  no  time  at  all  to  make 
up  his  choice.  Voruz  took  the  precious 
document,  with  the  signature  still  wet,  and 
went  out,  double  locking  the  door  behind 
him.  His  two  friends  turned  him  over  to 
the  custody  of  the  duke,  who  locked  him 
up  for  two  years  at  Grolee,  one  of  his 
castles  down  the  Rhone,  and  put  the  honest 
Abbot  of  Montheron  in  possession  of  the 
rich  living  of  St.  Victor. 

But  Bonivard  in  his  prison  was  less  to  be 
pitied  than  the  citizens  of  Geneva  who  re- 
mained in  their  subjugated  city.  The  two 
despots,  the  bishop  and  the  duke,  who  had 
seized  the  unhappy  town,  combined  to  crush 
the  gay  and  insubordinate  spirit  out  of  it. 
All  this  time,  says  Bonivard,  "they  im- 
prisoned, they  scourged,  they  tortured,  they 
beheaded,  they  hung,  so  as  it  is  pitiful  to 
tell." 

Meanwhile,  the  influential  family  friends 
of  Bonivard,  some  of  them  high  in  court 
favor,  discovering  that  he  was  yet  alive  and 
in  prison,  bestirred  themselves  to  procure 
his  liberation  ;  and  not  in  vain,  for  the  pos- 
session that  had  made  him  dangerous,  the 
priory  of  St.  Victor,  having  been  wrested 
from  him,  there  was  little  harm  that  he  could 
do.    His  immediate  successor  in  the  priory, 


122  THE  REAL  PRISONER   OP   CHILLON. 


good  Abbot  de  Montheron,  had  not  in- 
deed long  enjoyed  the  benefice.  He  had 
gone  on  business  to  Rome,  where  certain 
Churchmen  who  admired  his  new  benefice 
invited  him  (so  Bonivard  tells  the  story)  to 
a  banquet  more  Romano,  and  gave  him 
a  dose  of  the  "  cardinal  powder,"  which 
operated  so  powerfully  that  it  purged  the 
soul  right  out  of  the  body.  He  left  a  paper 
behind  him  in  which,  as  a  sign  of  remorse 
for  his  crime,  he  resigned  all  his  rights  in 
the  priory  back  to  Bonivard.*  But  the  pope, 
whose  natural  affection  towards  his  cousins 
and  nephews  overflowed  freely  in  the  form 
of  gifts  of  what  did  not  belong  to  him,  be- 
stowed the  living  on  a  cousin,  who  com- 
muted it  for  an  annual  revenue  of  six 
hundred  and  forty  gold  crowns — a  splen- 
did revenue  for  those  days — and  poor  Boni- 
vard, whose  sole  avocation  was  that  of 
gentleman,  found  it  difficult  to  carry  on 
this  line  of  business  with  neither  capital 
nor  income.  He  came  back,  some  five 
years  later,  into  possession  of  the  priory. 
They  were  five  years  of  exciting  changes, 
of  fierce  terrorism  and  oppression  at  Geneva, 
followed  by  a  respite,  a  rallying  of  the 
spirit  of  the  people,  an  actual  recovery  of 
some  of  the  old   rights  of  the  city,  and, 

*  The  text  of  this  act  is  given  by  Chaponniere,  p.  156. 


THE  REAL  PRISONER   OF   CHILLON.  123 


presently,  by  the  beginning  of  some  signs 
of  religious  light  coming  from  the  direction 
of  Germany.    And  the  way  in  which  Boni- 
vard  at  last  got  reinstalled  into  his  convent 
is  curiously  illustrative  of  the  strange  con- 
dition of  society  in  those  times.    One  May 
morning  in  1527  the  little  town   was  all 
agog  with  strange  news  from  Rome.     The 
Eternal    City  had  been  taken   by  storm, 
sacked,   pillaged,    burned  !      The   Roman 
bishop  was  prisoner  to  the  Roman  emperor, 
if  indeed  he   was   alive  at  all.      In  fact, 
there  was  a  rumor — dreadful,  no  doubt,  but 
attended    by   vast   consolations — that  the 
whole  court  of  Rome  had  perished.     Im- 
mediately there  was  a  rush  to  the  bishop's 
palace,  and  a  scramble  for  the  vacant  liv- 
ings in  the  diocese  that  had  been  held  by 
absentees  at  Rome.    The  bishop,  delighted 
at  such  a  windfall  of  patronage,  dispensed 
his  favors  right  and  left,  not  forgetting, 
says  Bonivard,  to  reserve  something  com- 
fortable for  himself  in  the  shape  of  a  fat 
convent  that  had  been  held  by  a  cardinal. 
This    was    Bonivard's    opportunity,    and, 
times  and  the   bishop  having  changed,  he 
got  back  once  more  into  his  cherished  quar- 
ters as  prior  of  St.  Victor.     The  convent 
was  there,  and  the  friars,  but  the  estates 
that  had  been  wont  to  keep  them  all  right 


124  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF   CHILLON. 

royally  were  mostly  in  the  hands  of  the 
duke  and  his  minions.  It  is  in  the  effort 
to  recover  these  that  Bonivard  shines  out 
in  his  most  magnificent  character,  that  of 
military  hero.  The  camj:>aign  of  Cartigny 
includes  the  most  memorable  of  his  feats  of 
arms. 

Cartigny  was  an  estate  about  six  miles 
down  the  left  bank  of  the  Rhone  from 
Geneva  appertaining  to  St.  Victor.  "It 
was  a  chastel  of  pleasaunce,  not  a  forter- 
esse,"  says  our  hero,  who  is  the  Homer  of 
his  own  brave  deeds.  But  the  duke  kept  a 
garrison  there,  and  to  every  demand  the 
prior  made  for  his  place  he  replied  that  he 
did  not  dare  give  it  up  for  fear  of  being  ex- 
communicated by  the  pope.  Rent-time 
came,  and  the  Savoyard  Government  en- 
joined the  tenants  not  to  pay  to  the  prior. 
Whereupon  that  potentate  declared  that, 
being  refused  civil  justice,  he  "fell  back 
on  the  law  of  nations." 

The  military  resources  of  his  realm  were 
limited.  He  counted  ten  able-bodied  sub- 
jects, but  they  were  monks  and  not  liable 
to  service.  The  culverins  of  his  uncle  were 
gone,  but  he  had  six  muskets — a  loan  from 
the  city — and  there  were  four  pounds  of 
powder  in  the  magazine.  But  this  was 
not  of  itself  sufficient  for  a  war  against  the 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON.     125 

Duke  of  Savoy.     He  must  subsidize  mer- 
cenaries. 

About  this  time  there  chanced  to  be  at 
Geneva  a  swashbuckler  from  Berne,  Bischel- 
bach  by  name,  by  trade  a  butcher,  who 
had  found  the  new  regime  of  the  Reform- 
ers at  that  city  too  straitlaced  for  his 
tastes  and  habits,  and  had  come  to  Ge- 
neva, with  some  vagabonds  at  his  heels,  in 
search  of  adventures  and  a  livelihood.  Him 
did  the  prior  of  St.  Victor,  greatly  im- 
pressed with  his  own  accounts  of  his  powers, 
commission  as  generalissimo  of  the  forces. 
Second  in  command  he  set  a  priest,  like- 
wise just  thrown  out  of  business  by  the 
Reformation  in  the  North  ;  and  in  a  council 
of  war  the  plan  of  campaign  was  deter- 
mined. But  before  the  actual  clash  of  arms 
began,  the  solemn  preliminaries  usual  be- 
tween hostile  powers  must  be  scrupulously 
fulfilled.  A  herald  was  commissioned  to 
make  proclamation  in  the  name  of  the  lord 
of  St.  Victor,  through  all  the  lands  of 
Cartigny,  that  no  man  should  venture  to 
execute  there  any  orders,  whether  of  pope 
or  duke,  under  penalty  of  being  hung.  This 
energetic  procedure  struck  due  terror,  for 
when  Bonivard's  captain  with  several  sol- 
diers appeared  before  the  castle  it  capitu- 
lated without  a  blow. 


126  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF   CHILLON. 


It  was  a  brief  though  splendid  victory. 
The  very  first  raid  in  which  the  "  Knights 
of  the  Spoon  " — an  association  of  neighbor- 
ing country  gentlemen — harried  that  region 
they  found  that  the  capitain  and  entire 
garrison  of  the  castle  had  gone  to  market 
(not  without  imputations  of  treason),  leav- 
ing the  post  in  charge  of  one  woman,  who 
promptly  surrendered. 

The  sovereign  of  St.  Victor's  blood  was 
up.  He  resolved  to  draw,  if  need  were,  on 
the  entire  resources  of  his  realm.  The  army 
was  promptly  reinforced  to  twenty  men, 
and  Bonivard  took  the  field  in  person  at 
the  head  of  his  forces.  On  what  wise  this 
array  debouched  in  two  corps  d'armee  one 
Sunday  morning  from  two  of  the  gates  of 
Geneva  ;  how  the  junction  of  the  forces 
was  effected  ;  the  military  history  of  the 
march  ;  how  they  appeared,  at  last,  before 
the  castle  of  Cartigny — are  these  not  writ- 
ten by  the  pen  of  the  hero  himself  in  his 
Chronicles  of  Geneva  ?  But  Bonivard, 
though  brave,  was  merciful.  Willing  to 
spare  the  effusion  of  blood,  he  sent  the 
general-in-chief,  Bischelbach,  with  his  ser- 
vant Diebolt  as  an  interpreter,  to  summon 
the  castle.  The  answer  was  a  shot  that 
knocked  poor  Diebolt  over  with  a  mortal 
wound;  whereupon  the  attacking  army  fell 


THE   REAL  PRISONER  OP  CHILLON.  127 


back  iii  a  masterly  manner  into  the  woods 
and  made  good  their  way  into  Geneva, 
bringing  one  prisoner,  whom  they  had 
caught  unarmed  near  the  castle,  and  leav- 
ing Diebolt  to  die  at  a  roadside  inn. 

We  may  not  further  narrate  the  deeds  of 
Bonivard  as  a  martial  hero,  though  they 
are  neither  few  nor  uninteresting.*  But  he 
is  equally  worthy  of  himself  as  a  religious 
reformer.  It  was  about  this  time  that  the 
stirrings  of  religious  reformation  at  Berne 
and  elsewhere  began  to  be  heard  at  Geneva, 
and  the  thought  began  to  be  seriously 
entertained  by  some  of  the  patriotic  "  Sons 
of  Geneva"  that  perhaps  that  liberty  for 
which  they  had  dared  and  suffered  so  much 
in  vain  might  best  come  with  that  gospel 
which  had  wrought  such  wonders  in  other 
communities.  There  was  one  man  who 
could  advise  them  what  to  do  ;  and  they 
went  together  over  to  the  convent  and 
sought  audience  and  ghostly  counsel  of  the 

*  We  have  the  history  of  one  of  them  in  a  brief  of  Pope 
Clement  VII.  addressed  to  the  chapter  and  senate  of  Ge- 
neva, in  which  he  expresses  his  sorrow  that  in  a  city 
which  he  has  carried  in  his  bowels  60  long  such  high- 
handed doings  should  be  allowed.  One  Francis  Bonivard 
has  not  only  despoiled  the  rightful  prior  of  his  living,  but 
—what  is  worse— has  chased  his  attorney  with  a  gun  and 
shot  the  horse  that  he  was  running  away  upon:  "  quodque 
peju*  est,  Franciscum  Tingum  ejusdem  electi  procura- 
torem,  negocium  restitucionis  dictce  possessionis  prose- 
quentem,  scloppettis  invasisse,  etequum  super  quo  fugiebat 
vulnerasse.''''  His  Holiness  threatens  spiritual  vengeance, 
and  explains  his  zeal  in  the  case  by  the  fact  that  the  ex- 
cluded prior  is  his  cousin. 


128  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON. 

prior.  "  We  are  going  to  have  done  with 
all  popish  ceremonies,"  said  they,  "and 
drive  out  the  whole  rabble- rout  of  papistry, 
monks,  priests,  and  all :  then  we  mean  to 
send  for  gospel  ministers  to  introduce  the 
true  Christian  Reformation."  It  is  pleasant 
to  imagine  the  expression  of  Bonivard's 
countenance  as  he  replied  to  his  ardent 
friends:  "It  is  a  very  praiseworthy  idea. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  all  these  ecclesiastics 
sadly  need  reformation.  I  am  one  of  them 
myself.  But  who  is  to  do  the  reforming  ? 
Whoever  it  is,  they  had  better  begin  opera- 
tions on  themselves.  If  you  are  so  fond  of 
the  gospel,  why  don't  you  practise  it?  It 
looks  as  if  you  did  not  so  much  love  the 
gospel  as  you  hate  us.  And  what  do  you 
hate  us  for  ?  It  is  not  because  we  are  so  dif- 
ferent from  you,  but  because  we  are  so  like. 
You  say  we  are  a  licentious  lot  ;  well,  so 
are  you.  We  drink  hard  ;  so  do  you.  We 
gamble  and  we  swear;  but  what  do  you  do,  I 
should  like  to  know?  Why  should  you  be 
so  hard  on  us  ?  We  don't  interfere  with 
your  little  enjoyments  :  for  pity's  sake, 
don't  meddle  with  ours.  You  talk  about 
driving  us  out  and  sending  for  the  Lutheran 
ministers.  Gentlemen,  think  twice  before 
you  do  it.  They  will  not  have  been  here 
two  years  before  you  will  wish  they  were 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF   CHILLON.  129 

gone.  If  you  dislike  us  because  we  are  too 
much  like  you,  you  will  detest  them  be- 
cause they  are  so  different  from  you.  My 
friends,  do  one  thing  or  the  other.  Either 
let  us  alone,  or,  if  you  must  do  some  re- 
forming, try  it  on  yourselves." 

Thus  did  this  excellent  pastor,  in  the 
spirit  of  the  gospel  injunction  to  count  the 
cost,  give  spiritual  counsel  to  those  who 
sought  reformation  of  the  Church.  "I 
warrant  you,"  he  wrote  concerning  them, 
"  they  went  off  with  their  tails  between 
their  legs.  I  am  as  fond  of  reformation 
as  anybody,  but  I  am  a  little  scrupulous 
as  to  who  shall  take  it  in  hand."  * 

Bonivard's  harum-scarum  raids  into  the 
Duke  of  Savoy's  dominions  after  rents  or 
reprisals  at  last  became  so  embarrassing  to 
his  Geneva  friends  that,  much  as  they  en- 
joyed the  fun  of  them,  it  became  necessary 
to  say  to  the  good  monk  that  this  sort  of 
thing  really  must  stop;  and  feeling  the 
force  of  his  argument,  that  he  must  have 
something  to  live  on,  the  city  council  al- 
lowed its  neighboring  potentate  a  subven- 
tion of  four  crowns  and  a  half  monthly  to 
enable  him  to  keep  up  a  state  worthy  of 
the  dignity  of  a  sovereign.  He  grumbled 
at  the  amount,  but  took  it;  and  thereafter 

*  Adviset  Devis  des  difformes  Reformateurz,  pp.  149-151. 


130  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON. 

the  peace  of  Europe  was  less  disturbed  on 
his  part. 

But  bad  news  came  to  the  gay  prior  in 
his  impoverished  monastery.  His  mother 
was  ill  at  his  old  home  at  Seyssel  in  Savoy, 
and  he  must  see  her  before  she  died.  It 
was  venturing  into  the  tiger's  den,  as  all 
his  friends  told  him,  and  as  he  did  not  need 
to  be  told.  But  he  thought  he  would  ad- 
venture it  if  he  could  get  a  safe-conduct 
from  the  tiger.  The  matter  was  arranged : 
the  duke  sent  Bonivard  his  passport,  lim- 
ited to  a  single  month;  and  the  prior  ar- 
rived at  Seyssel,  and  nearly  frightened  the 
poor  old  lady  out  of  her  last  breath  with 
her  sense  of  the  peril  to  which  he  had  ex- 
posed himself. 

Our  hero's  incomparable  genius  for 
getting  himself  into  difficulties  never  shone 
more  brightly  than  at  this  hour.  While 
here  in  the  country  of  his  mortal  enemy, 
on  the  last  days  of  his  expiring  safe-con- 
duct, he  got  news  of  accusations  gravely 
sustained  at  Geneva  that  he  had  gone  over 
into  Savoy  to  treat  with  the  enemy.  He 
did  not  dare  to  stay:  he  did  not  dare  to  go 
back.  If  he  could  get  his  safe-conduct  ex- 
tended for  one  month,  to  the  end  of  May, 
he  would  try  to  make  his  way  through  the 
Pays  de  Vaud  (then  belonging  to  Savoy) 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON.  131 


to  Fribourg  in  the  Swiss  Confederation. 
The  extension  was  granted,  and  with  many 
assurances  of  good-will  from  friends  of  the 
duke  he  pushed  on.  It  was  a  fine  May 
morning,  the  26th,  that  he  was  on  his  last 
day's  journey  to  Lausanne,  and  passing 
through  a  pine  wood.  Suddenly  men 
sprang  from  ambush  upon  Bonivard,  who 
grasped  his  sword  and  spurred,  calling  to 
his  guide,  "Put  spurs!"  But  instead  of 
so  doing  the  guide  turned  and  whipped  out 
his  knife  and  cut  Bonivard's  sword-belt; 
"Whereupon  these  worthy  gentlemen," 
says  Bonivard's  Chronicle,  "jumped  on  me 
and  took  me  prisoner  in  the  name  of  my 
lord  duke."  Safe-conducts  were  in  vain. 
A  bagful  of  ropes  was  produced,  and  he 
was  carried  on  a  mule,  bound  hand  and 
foot,  in  secrecy,  to  the  duke's  castle  of 
Chillon,  the  captain  of  which  was  one  of 
the  ambuscading  party.  For  six  years  he 
was  hidden  from  the  world,  and  at  first 
men  knew  not  whether  he  was  alive  or 
dead.  But  his  sufferings  at  the  hand  of 
the  common  foe  put  to  shame  the  suspicions 
that  had  been  engendered  at  Geneva,  and 
it  is  recorded,  to  the  honor  of  the  Genevese, 
that  during  all  that  period,  whenever 
negotiations  were  opened  between  them 
and  the  Duke  of  Savoy,  the  liberation  of 


132  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF  CHILLON. 

Bonivard  was  always  insisted  on  as  one  of 
the  conditions. 

The  story  of  the  imprisonment  is  soon 
told;  for,  strangely  enough,  this  most  gar- 
rulously egotistical  of  writers  never  alludes 
to  it  but  twice,  and  then  briefly.  The  first 
two  years  he  was  kept  in  the  upper  cham- 
bers of  the  castle  and  treated  kindly,  but 
at  the  end  of  this  time  the  castle  received 
a  visit  from  the  duke,  and  from  that  time 
forth  the  Prisoner  of  Chillon  was  remanded 
to  the  awful  and  sombre  crypt.  A  single 
sentence  in  his  handwriting  is  all  that  he 
tells  us  of  this  period,  of  which  he  might 
have  told  so  much,  and  in  this  he  shows  a 
disposition  to  look  at  the  affair  rather  in  its 
humorous  than  its  Byronesque  aspect. 
For  his  one  recorded  reminiscence  of  his 
four  years  of  dungeon-life  is,  that  "  he  had 
such  abundant  leisure  for  promenading 
that  he  wore  in  the  rock  pavement  a  little 
path  as  neatly  as  if  it  had  been  done  with 
a  stone-hammer."  * 

*  It  is  needful  to  caution  enthusiastic  tourists  that 
nearly  all  the  details  of  Byron's  poem  are  fabulous.  The 
two  brothers,  the  martyred  father,  the  anguish  of  the 
prisoner,  were  all  invented  by  the  poet  on  that  rainy  day 
in  the  tavern  at  Ouchy.  Even  the  level  of  the  dungeon, 
below  the  water  of  the  lake,  turns  out  to  be  a  mistake, 
although  Bonivard  believed  it:  the  floor  of  the  crypt  is 
eight  feet  above  high- water  mark.  As  for  the  thoughts 
of  the  prisoner,  they  seem  to  have  been  mainly  occupied 
with  making  Latin  and  French  verses  of  an  objectionable 
sort  not  adapted  for  general  publication.  (See  Ls.  Vul- 
liemin:  Chillon,  Etude  historique,  Lausanne,  1851.) 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OP  CHILLON.  133 

One  March  morning  in  1536  the  Prisoner 
of  Chillon  heard  through  the  windows  of 
his  dungeon  the  sound  of  a  cannonade  by 
land  and  lake.  It  was  the  army  of  Berne, 
which  was  finishing  its  victorious  campaign 
through  the  Pays  de  Vaud  by  the  siege  of 
the  duke's  last  remaining  stronghold,  the 
castle  of  Chillon.  They  were  joyfully 
aided  by  a  flotilla  fitted  out  by  Geneva, 
which  had  never  forgotten  its  old  friend. 
That  night  the  dungeon-door  was  burst 
open,  and  Bonivard  and  three  fellow-pris- 
oners were  carried  off  in  triumph  to  Geneva. 

Not  Rip  Van  Winkle  when  he  awoke 
from  his  long  slumber  in  the  Catskills,  not 
the  Seven  Sleepers  of  Ephesus  when  they 
came  back  from  their  sepulchre  and  found 
their  city  Christian,  had  a  better  right  to 
be  surprised  than  the  prior  of  St.  Victor 
when  he  got  back  to  Geneva.  Duke  and 
bishop  and  all  their  functionaries  were  ex- 
pelled; priests  and  preaching-friars  were 
gone;  the  mass  was  abolished;  in  the  cathe- 
dral of  St.  Peter's  and  all  the  lesser  churches, 
which  had  been  cleared  of  their  images, 
there  were  singing  of  psalms  and  preaching 
of  fiery  sermons  by  Reformers  from  France; 
and  the  streets  through  which  he  had 
sometimes  had  to  move  by  stealth  were 
filled  with  joyous  crowds  to  hail  him  as  a 


134  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OP  CHILLON. 

martyr.  St.  Victor  was  no  more.  If  he 
went  to  look  for  his  old  home,  he  found  a 
heap  of  rubbish,  for  all  the  suburbs  of  the 
city  that  might  give  shelter  to  an  enemy 
had  been  torn  down  by  the  unsparing 
patriots  of  Geneva,  and  the  trees  had  been 
felled.  The  joyous  city  had  ceased,  and 
Bonivard's  prophecy  to  his  roystering  com- 
panions was  not  long  in  being  fulfilled  for 
himself  as  well  as  for  them:  they  soon 
found  Calvin's  little  finger  to  be  heavier 
than  the  bishop's  loins. 

And  yet  the  heroic  little  town  showed  a 
noble  gratitude  towards  the  old  friendof  its 
liberties.  The  house  which  he  chose  out 
of  all  the  city  was  given  him  for  his  own 
and  furnished  at  the  public  expense.  A 
pension  of  two  hundred  crowns  a  year  in 
gold  was  settled  on  him,  and  he  was  made 
a  senator  of  the  republic.  To  all  which 
was  added  a  condition  that  he  should  lead 
a  respectable  life — a  proviso  which  is  prac- 
tically explained  in  the  very  next  appear- 
ance of  his  name  in  the  records  on  account 
of  a  misdemeanor  for  which  his  accomplice 
was  ordered  to  quit  the  town  within  three 
days. 

The  more  generous  was  the  town  the 
more  exacting  became  the  Martyr.  He 
could  not  get  over  his  free-and-easy  way 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OP  CHILLON.  135 

of  living  in  the  gay  old  days  when  the 
tithes  of  his  benefice  yielded  him  nigh  a 
thousand  yellow  crowns  a  year.  He  could 
not  see  why  he  was  not  entitled  to  have 
his  rents  back  again;  and  after  a  vain  ef- 
fort on  the  part  of  the  council  to  make  him 
see  it,  he  went  off  to  Berne,  where  he  had 
been  admitted  a  citizen,  to  ask  it  to  inter- 
fere for  him,  sending  back  an  impudent 
letter  renouncing  his  Geneva  citizenship, 
on  the  ground  that  in  his  reduced  circum- 
stances he  could  not  afford  to  be  a  citizen 
in  two  places  at  once.  For  a  while  the 
patient  city  lost  its  patience  with  its  unruly 
beneficiary,  but  the  genuine  grateful  and 
kindly  feeling  that  every  one  felt  for  the 
poor  fellow,  and  the  general  admiration  for 
his  learning  and  wit,  conspired  with  his 
growing  embarrassments  to  bring  about  a 
settlement  of  the  affair  on  the  basis  of  a 
reduced  pension  with  a  round  lump  sum  to 
pay  his  debts. 

They  sent  for  him  two  or  three  years 
later  to  come  to  Geneva  as  historiographer, 
and  he  came,  bringing  with  him  a  wife  from 
Berne,  who  died  soon  after  his  arrival. 
For  a  man  of  his  years,  he  had  a  remark- 
able alacrity  at  getting  married,  and  his 
second  venture  was  an  unlucky  one.  For 
from   the   wedding-day  onward,  when  he 


136  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF   CHILLON. 

was  not  before  the  council  with  some  quar- 
rel or  some  affair  of  debt,  he  was  apt  to 
come  before  it  to  get  them  to  compel  his 
wife  to  live  with  him,  or,  failing  that,  to 
get  her  money  to  live  on  himself.  What 
time  could  be  saved  from  these  wranglings, 
which  lasted  almost  till  the  poor  woman's 
death,  was  devoted  ardently  to  his  liter- 
ary work.  The  history  grew  apace,  and 
other  books  besides.  In  the  seditions  of 
the  Libertine  party  against  the  austerities 
of  the  new  regime  the  old  man  took  the 
side  of  law  and  order  and  good  morals  in 
his  book  on  JOancienne  et  nouvelle  Police 
de  Geneve,  with  an  ardor  that  was  the 
more  surprising  as  one  remembered  his 
antecedents.  In  the  midst  of  his  toils  he 
found  time  to  get  married  to  a  third  wife 
and  to  go  to  law  with  his  neighbors.  He 
is  continually  coming  to  the  council,  some- 
times for  a  little  loan  to  help  him  with  his 
lawsuits,  sometimes  for  relief  in  his  embar- 
rassments. It  is  touching  to  see  how  ten- 
der they  are  towards  the  poor  foolish  old 
man.  They  make  him  little  grants  from 
time  to  time,  always  looking  to  it  that 
their  money  shall  be  applied  to  the  object 
designated,  and  not  "on  his  fantasies." 
They  take  up  one  of  his  notes  for  him,  look- 
ing to  see  that  it  has  not  been  tampered  with 


THE  REAL   PRISONER  OF  CHILLON.  137 

because  "  he  is  easily  circumvented  and  not 
adroit  in  his  business."  He  complains  of 
the  heat  during  an  illness  one  summer,  and 
the  seigneurie  give  him  the  White  Chamber 
in  the  town-hall,  and  when  winter  comes 
on  and  he  is  old,  and  infirm,  they  assign 
him  the  lodging  lately  occupied  by  Ma- 
thurin  Cordier  (famous  schoolmaster  Cor- 
derius,  whose  Dialogues  were  the  first 
book  in  Latin  of  our  grandfathers),  because 
it  contained  a  stove — a  rare  luxury.  He 
thanks  them  for  their  kindness  as  his  fathers, 
and  makes  them  heirs  of  his  library  and 
manuscripts. 

There  was  another  and  more  solemn 
assemblage,  his  relations  with  which  were 
less  tender.  This  was  the  consistory  of 
the  Church,  which  found  it  less  easy  to 
allow  for  the  old  man's  infirmities.  His 
first  appearance  before  this  body  was  under 
accusation  of  playing  at  dice  with  Clement 
Marot,  another  famous  character  and  the 
sweet  singer  of  the  French  Reformation. 
He  comes  next  time  of  his  own  accord, 
asking  the  venerable  brethren  to  interfere 
because  his  second  wife  ran  away  from  him 
on  their  wedding-day,  she  defending  her- 
self on  the  ground  of  a  bad  cold.  His 
domestic  troubles  bring  him  hither  so  often 
as  to  put  the  clergy  out  of  patience.     He 


138  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OP  CHILLON. 

is  called  up  for  beating  his  wife,  but  shows 
that  the  discipline  was  needed,  and  she  is 
admonished  to  be  more  obedient  in  future. 
Later  on  he  is  questioned  why  he  does  not 
come  to  church.  He  can't  walk,  is  the 
answer.  But  he  is  told  that  if  he  can  get 
himself  carried  to  the  hotel  de  ville  to  see 
the  new  carvings,  he  could  get  carried  to 
church.  And  why  does  he  neglect  the 
communion  ?  Answer  :  He  has  been  de- 
barred from  it.  "Then  present  your  re- 
quest to  be  restored."  So  the  poor  old 
gentleman  presents  himself  six  weeks  later, 
asking  to  be  readmitted  to  the  Church  ; 
which  is  granted,  but  with  the  remark, 
entered  on  the  record,  that  he  "  does  not 
show  much  contrition  in  coming  with  a 
bunch  of  flowers  over  his  ear — a  thing  very 
unbecoming  in  a  man  of  his  years." 

The  dreadful  consistory  had  a  principal 
concern  in  the  affair  that  darkened  the  de- 
clining days  of  Bonivard  with  the  shadow 
of  a  tragedy.  An  escaped  nun  had  found 
refuge  in  his  lodgings  after  his  third  wife's 
death  ;  and  after  some  love-making — on 
which  side  was  disputed — there  was  a 
promise  of  marriage  given  by  him,  which, 
however,  he  was  in  no  hurry  to  fulfil.  The 
consistory  deemed  it  best  to  interfere,  in 
the  interests  of  propriety,  and  insist  on  the 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF   CHILLON.  139 

marriage  ;  and  the  decrepit  old  invalid  in 
vain  pleaded  his  age  and  bodily  infirmities. 
So  he  was  married  in  spite  of  himself  to 
his  nun,  and  showed  his  disj>osition  to 
make  the  best  of  it  by  making  her  a  wed- 
ding-present of  his  new  Latin  treatise,  just 
finished,  on  The  Origin  of  Evil,  and  re- 
ceiving in  tender  return  a  Greek  copy  of 
the  Philippics  of  Demosthenes.  Three 
years  later  the  wretched  woman  was  ac- 
cused of  adultery,  and  being  put  to  the 
torture  confessed  her  crime  and  was 
drowned  in  a  sack,  while  her  paramour  was 
beheaded.  Bonivard,  being  questioned, 
declared  his  belief  of  her  innocence,  and 
that  her  worst  faults  were  that  she  wanted 
to  make  him  too  pious,  and  tormented  him 
to  begin  preaching,  and  sometimes  beat 
him  when  he  had  a  few  friends  in  to 
drink.* 

For  five  years  after  this  catastrophe  the 
old  man  lingered,  tended  by  hirelings,  but 
watched  with  filial  gratitude  by  the  little 
state  whose  liberties  he  had  helped  to  save, 
and  whose  heroic  history  he  has  recorded. 

*  This  touching  tribute  of  conjugal  affection  is  all  the 
more  honorable  to  Bonivard  from  the  fact  that  this 
wife,  like  the  others,  had  provoked  him.  Only  a  few 
months  before  he  had  been  compelled  to  appear  before 
the  consistory  to  answer  for  treating  her  in  a  public  place 
with  profane  and  abusive  language,  applying  to  her  some 
French  term  which  is  expressed  in  the  record  only  by 
abbreviations. 


140  THE  REAL  PRISONER  OP   CHILLON. 

He  had  at  least  the  comfort  of  having  fin- 
ished that  great  work  ;  and  when  he 
brought  the  manuscript  of  it  to  the  coun- 
cil, they  referred  it  to  a  committee  with 
Master  Calvin  at  the  head  ;  who  reported 
that  it  was  written  in  a  rude  and  familiar 
style,  quite  beneath  the  dignity  of  history, 
and  that  for  this  and  other  reasons  it 
had  better  not  be  printed.  The  precious 
manuscript  was  laid  on  the  shelf  until  in 
the  lapse  of  years  it  was  found  that  the 
very  reasons  why  those  solemn  critics  re- 
jected it  were  the  things  that  gave  it 
supreme  value  to  a  later  age.  It  has  been 
the  pride  of  Geneva  scholars  to  print  in 
elegant  archaic  style  every  page  written 
by  the  Prisoner  of  Chillon  in  prose  or  verse, 
on  history,  polity,  philology  and  theology.* 

*  Like  every  subject  relating  to  the  history  of  Geneva, 
the  life  of  Bonivard  has  been  thoroughly  studied  by  local 
antiquarians  and  historians.  The  most  important  work 
on  the  subject  is  that  of  Dr.  Chaponnifcre,  before  cited ; 
this  is  reprinted  (but  without  the  documents  attached)  as 
a  preface  to  the  new  edition  of  the  Chronicles.  M.  Edmond 
Chevrier,  in  a  slight  pamphlet  (Macon,  1868),  gives  a  criti- 
cal account  both  of  the  man  and  of  his  writings.  Besides 
these  may  be  named  Vulliemin  :  Chillon  Etude  historique, 
Lausanne,  1851 ;  J.  Gaberel :  Le  Chateau  de  Chillon  et 
Bonivard,  Geneva.  Marc  Monnier,  Geneve  et  ses  Poetes 
(Geneva,  1847),  gives  an  excellent  criticism  on  Bonivard  as 
author.  For  original  materials  consult  besides  the  work 
of  Chaponniere)  Galiffe :  Materiaux  pour  VHis*oire  de 
Geneve,  and  Cramer;  Notes  extraites  des  Registres  du 
Consistoire,  a  rare  book  in  lithography  (Geneva,  1853). 
A  weak  little  article  in  the  Catholic  World  for  September, 
1876,  bravely  attacks  Bonivard  as  "  one  of  the  Protestant 
models  of  virtue,"  and  triumphantly  proves  him  to  have 
been  far  from  perfect.  The  charge,  however,  that  he  was 
"  a  traitor  to  his  ecclesiastical  character,"  and  "  quitted 


THE  REAL  PRISONER  OF   CHILLON.  141 


Somewhere  about  September,  1570,  Fran- 
cis Bonivard  died,  aged  seventy-seven, 
lonely  and  childless,  leaving  the  city  his 
heir.  The  cherished  collection  of  books 
that  was  the  comfort  of  his  harassed  life 
has  grown  into  the  library  of  a  university, 
and  the  little  walled  town  for  whose 
ancient  liberties  he  ventured  such  perils 
and  suffered  such  imprisonment  is,  and  for 
the  three  hundred  years  since  has  been, 
one  of  the  chief  radiant  centres  of  light 
and  liberty  for  all  the  world. 

his  convent  and  broke  his  vows,"  is  founded  on  a  blunder. 
Bonivard  never  took  monastic  vows  or  holy  orders,  but 
held  his  living-  in  commendam,  as  a  layman.  The  main 
resource,  bowever,  for  Bonivard's  life  up  to  his  liberation 
from  Chillon  is  in  his  own  works,  especially  the  Chronicles 
(Geneva,  edition  Fick,  1867). 


WM.  LLOYD  GARRISON 


WILLIAM  LLOYD  GARRISON. 


Havixg  frequent  occasion,  in  the  prose- 
cution of  certain  historical  studies,  to  refer 
to  the  voluminous  biography  of  Mr.  Gar- 
rison, written  by  two  of  his  sons,*  we  find 
the  question  again  and  again  recurring  : 
What  idea  of  the  man  and  his  times  would 
be  got  from  these  volumes  by  one  who  had 
no  other  source  of  information  ? 

It  is  a  question  not  altogether  easy  to 
answer  off-hand.  Doubtless  the  idea  would 
be  somewhat  confused  at  first ;  but  being 
allowed  to  settle  and  clarify  itself,  after 
some  cancelling  of  contradictions  and  elim- 
inating of  impossibilities,  it  would  come 
out  somewhat  in  this  shape  : 

Mr.  Garrison  was  a  man  of  meek,  gentle 
and  affectionate  spirit,  and  wholly  blame- 
less character,  who  devoted  himself  at  an 
early  age,  with  absolute  unselfishness,  to 
universal  philanthropy,  and  especially  to 
the  abolition  of  slavery.  Beginning  this 
work  with  a  nearly  unanimous  public  sen- 
timent on  his  side,  he  pushed  it  forward 

*  "  William  Lloyd  Garrison  :  1805-1879.    The  Story  of  his 
Life  told  by  his  Children."    New  York  :  The  Century  Co 
1885, 1889.  J 


146  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

with  such  boldness,  ability,  tact  and  dis- 
cretion, that  by  the  end  of  fifteen  years  he 
had  brought  the  public  opinion  of  the  na- 
tion, both  South  and  North,  into  almost 
equally  unanimous  antagonism  to  himself. 
Particularly  was  this  true  of  the  Christian 
Church  and  ministry  in  America,  who  had 
shown  him  hearty  sympathy  at  first ;  but 
many  of  whom,  including  men  who  are  even 
yet  held  in  the  highest  veneration  and  love, 
actually  engaged  in  active  opposition  to 
slavery  with  the  nefarious  purpose  of 
thereby  sustaining  that  wicked  institution; 
and  when  Mr.  Garrison,  in  the  simple  ful- 
filment of  his  duty,  rebuked  such  conduct, 
they  abused  him,  the  gentle  Garrison,  with 
vituperative  language.  This  conspiracy  of 
the  entire  Christian  Church  against  him, 
simply  for  his  superior  righteousness,  was 
only  exceeded  in  wickedness  by  the  abom- 
inable conduct  of  many  of  his  nearest 
friends  and  benefactors  and  most  self-sac- 
rificing fellow-laborers,  who  had  the  hardi- 
hood to  separate  from  his  Society,  and  set 
up  another  society  and  newspaper  which 
they  called  anti-slavery,  but  which  the 
acumen  of  Mr.  Garrison  at  once  recognized 
as  "  the  worst  form  of  pro-slavery."  Thus, 
deserted  and  betrayed  by  men  whom  for 
years  he  had  extolled  as  among  the  noblest 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  147 

of  the  human  race,  he  was  publicly  de- 
clared at  last,  by  one  of  his  few  remaining 
adherents,  to  be  "  the  only  righteous  in  a 
world  perverse." 

In  nothing  was  this  good  man's  abhor- 
rence of  slavery  more  shiningly  illustrated 
than  in  his  rejection  of  any  slavish  bond- 
age to  his  own  consistency.  At  some 
periods  in  his  career  he  was  a  gradual 
abolitionist,  a  gradual  emancipationist,  a 
colonizationist,  in  favor  of  compensated 
emancipation,  devoted  to  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States,  inculcating  the  exer- 
cise of  citizenship,  and  maintaining  a  nar- 
row and  rigid  Sabbatarianism.  He  had 
held  these  views  in  the  simplicity  and  in- 
nocence of  his  heart  ;  but  such  was  the 
wild  and  swift  degeneracy  of  the  age  and 
people,  that  after  he  laid  them  down,  they 
were  never  afterwards  held  by  anybody 
else,  except  with  vile  insincerity,  by  patent 
fallacy,  with  abominable  motives,  for  atro- 
cious ends. 

His  methods  as  a  reformer  were  original 
almost  to  the  point  of  paradox.  He  had 
two  main  objects  :  1,  Immediate  emanci- 
pation of  slaves  by  their  holders  ;  2,  im- 
mediate abolition  of  slavery  by  the  repeal 
of  the  slave  code.  The  first  was  sought  by 
a  style  of  address  to  the  slaveholders  that 


148  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

enraged  every  man  of  them  against  him 
and  his  views  to  the  utmost  fury.  The 
second  was  to  be  achieved  by  persuading 
all  opponents  of  slavery  into  abdicating 
their  rights  and  powers  as  citizens,  and  so 
committing  the  control  of  legislation  ex- 
clusively to  the  upholders  of  that  iniqui- 
tous system.  But  in  the  prosecution  of  this 
bold  and  energetic  policy,  the  good  Garri- 
son was  sadly  hindered  by  the  criminal 
folly  of  those  who  thought  that  one  good 
way  to  oppose  bad  laws  in  a  republic  was 
to  vote  against  them,  and  who  thus  com- 
mitted themselves  to  "  the  worst  and  most 
dangerous  form  of  pro-slavery." 

But  nothing  in  all  this  good  man's  career 
was  so  wonderful  as  his  success.  At  last, 
by  the  power  of  his  "sweet  reasonable- 
ness," he  so  far  won  the  people  of  the  free 
States  to  sympathy  with  his  abhorrence  of 
the  Constitution  and  Union  of  the  United 
States  and  his  sense  of  the  sinfulness  of 
voting,  that  they  formed  a  great  political 
party  in  which  every  principle  character- 
istic of  Mr.  Garrison  was  repudiated,  and 
fought  out  at  the  polls  the  old  issue,  that 
was  old  when  Garrison  was  a  baby.  But 
his  greatest  triumph  was  when  his  peace 
and  non-resistance  principles  had  gained 
such  a  hold  over  the  popular  mind,  that  at 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  149 


last  a  million  of  men  stood  in  arms  and 
entered  into  the  bloodiest  war  of  recent 
times  for  the  maintenance  of  the  Union  and 
Constitution  which  Mr.  Garrison  detested 
— a  war  in  which  every  death  was  held  by 
him  to  be  a  wicked  murder,  and  the  inci- 
dental result  of  which  was  the  abolition  of 
slavery. 

It  was  a  fitting  close  to  this  triumphant 
career,  that  when  he  had  accomplished  his 
great  work,  he  for  himself  and  his  family 
and  friends  in  his  behalf,  should  step 
promptly  forward  as  they  have,  to  accept 
for  him  the  homage  due  to  successful  and 
humane  achievement. 

Such  is  the  paradoxical,  but  filially  pious 
portraiture  of  Mr.  Garrison  given  in  these 
volumes.  The  hero  of  them  is  depicted  as 
a  noble  and  wholly  faultless  character,  of 
whom  the  world  was  not  worthy.  Indeed 
it  is  hardly  so  much  the  worthiness  of  the 
hero  as  the  world's  unworthiness  of  him 
that  most  impresses  the  reader's  mind.  One 
who  reads  believing  is  shocked,  from  page 
to  page,  with  growing  proofs  of  the  utter 
debasement  and  turpitude  of  the  generation 
in  which  he  lived,  especially  of  those  who 
pass  for  the  best  men  of  it  ;  and  with  the 
vile  perfidy  towards  Mr.  Garrison  of  such 
large  numbers  of  those  who  came  into  in- 


150  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


timate  relations  with  him,  in  business,  in 
reform-agitation,  and  in  personal  friend- 
ship. 

No  trait  of  Mr.  Garrison's  character  is 
more  emphasized  and  illustrated  by  his 
biographers  than  his  singular  equanimity, 
self-control  and  gentleness  of  temper.  His 
mildness  of  manner  and  expression  are  the 
theme  of  repeated  and  admiring  comment; 
and  it  is  demonstrated,  not  boastfully  per- 
haps, but  with  evident  pride,  that  his  re- 
markable composure,  in  circumstances 
which  to  most  men  would  have  been  ex- 
citing to  the  last  degree,  was  due  not  to  self- 
control,  but  to  the  actual  absence  of  excite- 
ment. Contrariwise  to  the  public  impres- 
sion of  him,  he  was  not  a  man  of  hasty  or 
irritable  temper,  or  given  to  grudges  or 
evil  thoughts  of  others,  but  one  who 
cherished  not  merely  a  doctrine  of  non-re- 
sistance, but  actual  kindly  feelings  towards 
bitter  enemies.  And  yet,  as  we  read,  we 
do  come  upon  language  of  his  that  has  a 
different  sound.  For  instance,  in  a  long 
article  on  the  remonstrances  of  some  of  his 
best  friends  and  fellow-reformers  against 
what  they  deemed  the  harshness  and  se- 
verity of  his  language,  he  says  : 

"The  same  cuckoo  cry  is  raised  against  me 
now  as  I  heard  when  I  stood  forth  alone  ;  and 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  151 


the  same  sagacious  predictions  and  grave  admo- 
nitions are  uttered  now  as  were  then  spoken 
with  the  infallibility  of  ignorance,  the  disin- 
terestedness of  cowardice,  and  the  prudence  of 
imbecility.  There  are  many  calling  themselves 
anti-slavery  men  who,  because  they  are  only 
1  half-fledged '  themselves,  and  have  neither 
the  strength  nor  the  courage  to  soar,  must  needs 
flutter  and  scream  because  my  spirit  will  not 
stoop  in  its  flight  heavenward,  and  come  down 
to  their  filthy  nest."— [Vol.  I.  459,  460.] 

Improving  upon  this  pleasing  metaphor, 
he  characterizes  the  General  Conference  of 
the  Methodist  Church  as  "a  cage  of  un- 
clean birds,  and  synagogue  of  Satan." 
[II.  78.]  The  action  of  the  Consociation 
of  Rhode  Island  in  declining  to  entertain  a 
memorial  from  an  epicene  convention  in 
Boston  is  declared  to  be  "  clerical  ruffian- 
ism." [II.  220,  n.]  And  the  Rev.  Charles 
T.  Torrey,  who  not  long  after  died  a  martyr 
to  his  anti-slavery  convictions  in  the  Balti- 
more jail,  but  who  had  been  guilty  of  the 
"sedition"  (so  Mr.  Garrison  termed  it) 
of  desiring  another  Society  and  another 
journal  than  Garrison's  is  described  as 
coming  in  "the  full  tide  of  his  priestly 
bile."  [II.  270.]  We  have  these  occasional 
specimens  of  a  style  of  expression  which  in 
most  men  would  be  indicative  of  anger,  or 
hatred,  or  some  evil  passion,  although  in 


152  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

this  book  no  evidence  appears,  except  in 
expressions  of  shame,  disgust  and  heart- 
sickness  on  the  part  of  many  of  Garrison's 
best  friends,  that  his  habitual  style  was 
that  of  the  most  brutally  vituperative  writer 
of  his  time.  And  yet  the  testimony,  both 
of  himself  and  of  others  who  knew  him,  is 
that  he  was  a  man  of  exceptional  mildness 

and  gentleness  of  temper.  What  solution 
can  be  found  for  so  strange  a  paradox  ? 

That  which  is  suggested  by  one  of  his 
admiring  friends  and  cited  by  his  biogra- 
phers, seems  not  improbable.  Miss  Harriet 
Martineau,  in  1835,  found  his  countenance 
to  be 

"  wholly  expressive  of  purity,  animation  and 
gentleness."  "His  conversation  .  .  .  is  of 
the  most  practical  cast.  .  .  .  Sagacity  is  the 
most  striking  attribute  of  his  conversation.  It 
has  none  of  the  severity,  the  harshness,  the  bad 
taste  of  his  writing ;  it  is  as  gladsome  as  his 
countenance,  and  as  gentle  as  his  voice.  Through 
the  whole  of  his  deportment  breathes  the  evi- 
dence of  a  heart  at  ease.  ...  I  do  not  pre- 
tend to  like  or  to  approve  the  tone  of  Garrison's 
printed  censures.  I  could  not  use  such  language 
myself  towards  any  class  of  offenders,  nor  can 
I  sympathize  in  its  use  by  others.  But  it  is  only 
fair  to  mention  that  Garrison  adopts  it  warily; 
and  that  I  am  persuaded  that  he  is  elevated 
above  passion  and  has  no  unrighteous  anger  to 
vent  in  harsh  expressions.  .  .  .  He  gives  his 
reasons  for  his  severity  with  a  calmness,  meek- 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  158 


ness  and  softness  which  contrast  strongly  with 
the  subject  of  the  discourse,  and  which  convince 
the  objector  that  there  is  principle  at  the  bot- 
tom of  the  praotice."— [II.  70-71.] 

It  seems  a  hard  thing  for  sons  to  have 
to  say  of  a  father  whom  they  love  and 
venerate,  and  yet  it  seems  to  be  true,  that 
the  frenzied  and  unbridled  scurrility  of 
Garrison's  polemic,  such  as  might  be  ex- 
tenuated, not  excused,  on  the  ground  of 
irritated  feeling  or  excited  passion,  was 
really  adopted  by  him  "warily,"  without  a 
particle  of  animosity,  in  cold  blood,  as  a 
matter  of  policy  for  the  accomplishment 
of  a  purpose.  There  was  no  noble  and 
irrepressible  rage  in  it.  His  feelings  never 
ran  away  with  him,  no  matter  how  diabol- 
ical the  wickedness  that  confronted  him.  A 
very  striking  illustration  of  this  self-com- 
mand is  presented  in  these  volumes.  On 
the  subject   of   liquor-selling,   said  he,  in 

1829  : 

"  We  who  are  somewhat  impetuous  in  our  dis- 
position and  singular  in  our  notions  of  reform — 
who  are  so  uncharitable  as  to  make  no  distinc- 
tion between  men  engaged  in  one  common  traf- 
fic, which  shall  excuse  the  destroyer  of  thou- 
sands and  heap  contumely  on  the  murderer  of  a 
dozen— we  demand  that  the  whole  truth  be  told 
on  all  occasions,  whether  it  induces  persecution 
or  occasions  a  breach  of  private  friendship.  .  .  . 
If  it  be  injurious,  or  criminal,  or  dangerous,  or 


154  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

disreputable  to  drink  ardent  spirits,  it  is  far 
more  so  to  vend,  or  distil,  or  import  this  liquid 
fire.  '  Woe  unto  him  who  putteth  the  cup  to 
his  neighbor's  lips'— who  increases  his  wealth 
at  the  expense  of  the  bodies  and  souls  of  men 
— who  takes  away  the  bread  of  the  poor  and 
devours  the  earnings  of  industry — who  scat- 
ters his  poison  through  the  veins  and  arte- 
ries of  the  community,  till  even  the  grave  is 
burdened  with  his  victims !  Against  him  must 
the  artillery  of  public  indignation  be  brought  to 
bear ;  and  the  decree  must  go  forth,  as  from  the 
lips  of  Jehovah,  that  he  who  will  deal  in  the 
accursed  article  can  lay  no  claim  to  honesty  of 
purpose  or  holiness  of  life,  but  is  a  shameless 
enemy  to  the  happiness  and  prosperity  of  his 
fellow-creatures." — [I.  155,  156.] 

"  He  looked  upon  *  every  distiller  or  vender 
of  ardent  spirits '  as  '  a  poisoner  of  the  health  and 
morals  of  community ' ;  and  could  even  say,  in 
his  address  in  1832  before  the  second  annual  Con- 
vention of  the  People  of  Color  in  Philadelphia  : 
1  God  is  my  witness  that  great  as  is  my  detesta- 
tion of  slavery  and  the  foreign  slave  trade,  I 
had  rather  be  a  slaveholder — yea,  a  kidnapper 
on  the  African  coast — than  sell  this  poison  to 
my  fellow-creatures  for  common  consump- 
tion.'"—[I.  268.] 

This  was  in  1832.  In  1833,  this  uncom- 
promising reformer,  burning  with  holy  in- 
dignation, had  the  golden  opportunity  of 
confronting,  in  the  midst  of  his  ill-gotten 
and  blood-stained  wealth,  one  of  the  most 
notorious  of  these  monsters,  more  detest- 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARFISON.  155 

able  than  the  slaveholder  and  the  kidnap- 
per, these  murderers  and  public  poisoners, 
of  whom  he  was  resolved  to  speak  the 
truth  on  all  occasions  however  embarrass- 
ing. It  was  a  peculiarly  flagrant  case,  for 
the  caitiff  wretch  had  not  only  openly 
made  and  sold  his  liquid  damnation,  but 
had  commended  it  to  his  neighbors'  lips  in 
that  seductive  form  known  as  Buxton's 
Entire  ;  and  nevertheless,  was  holding  a 
high  position  in  the  public  esteem,  and 
giving  himself  the  airs  of  a  philanthropist 
and  reformer  and  Christian.  In  all  Mr. 
Garrison's  stormy  career,  he  never  had  so 
good  an  opportunity  for  unlimbering  the 
"  artillery  of  indignation  "  for  a  point-blank 
shot.  But  instead  of  this  he  speaks  with 
undisguised  delight  of  a  "  polite  invitation 
by  letter"  from  this  ogre  "to  take  breakfast 
with  him  "  ;  on  which  occasion  our  ref  orm- 
er,instead  of  warning  his  host  of  the  hypoc- 
risy of  his  "claim  of  honesty  of  purpose 
or  holiness  of  life  "  and  faithfully  denounc- 
ing him  as  the  "shameless  enemy  of  his 
fellow-creatures,"  accepted  his  breakfast 
and  his  compliments  without  a  syllable  of 
protest ;  and  after  returning  to  America, 
described  him  as  "  the  worthy  successor  of 
Wilberforce,  our  esteemed  friend  and  coad- 
jutor, Thomas  Fowell  Buxton,"  and  declares 


156  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


that,  aside  from  a  single  mistake  of  anti- 
slavery  policy,  "  Mr.  Buxton  deserves  uni- 
versal admiration  and  gratitude  for  his  long- 
continued,  able  and  disinterested  efforts, 
amidst  severe  ridicule  and  malignant  op- 
position, to  break  every  yoke  and  set  the 
oppressed  free." — [I.  351,  352.] 

Miss  Martineau  was  right.  The  spirit  of 
the  prophet  was  completely  subject  unto 
the  prophet.  He  was  able  to  restrain  the 
fury  of  his  indignation  against  this  mon- 
strous criminal,  and  devote  all  his  energies, 
in  England,  to  hounding,  pestering  and 
abusing  the  agent  of  a  benevolent  enter- 
prise, of  which  less  than  four  years  before, 
Garrison  himself  had  been  an  extravagant 
eulogist.  The  Colonization  agent  was  guilty 
of  not  keeping  up  with  Garrison  in  the 
nimble  changes  of  his  mind  from  love  to 
hate ;  and  this  was  a  crime  as  much  worse 
than  Buxton's  as  Buxton's  was  worse  than 
that  of  the  slaveholder  and  the  kidnapper. 
But  let  it  not  be  supposed  that  even  this 
badgering  of  the  Colonization  agent  was  a 
matter  of  indignation.  As  Miss  Martineau 
perceived,  it  was  only  "  sagacity  " — part  of 
a  course  "adopted  warily,"  and  on  "prin- 
ciple " — a  course  disgusting  enough  to  her, 
as  well  as  to  Whittier,  and  Follen,  and  the 
Tappans,  and  many  others,  but  which  never- 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  157 


theless,  as  be  calmly  explained,  with  "  glad- 
some countenance  "  and  "  gentle  voice,"  had 
to  be  pursued  as  a  matter  of  policy. 

It  is  not  impossible  to  comprehend  the 
situation  in  which  Mr.  Garrison  felt  him- 
self drawn  or  driven  to  this  disgraceful 
policy.  We  must  remember  how  scanty  were 
the  resources  not  only  material  and  social, 
but  intellectual,  with  which  he  entered  on 
his  crusade.  He  was  a  decidedly  bright 
young  fellow,  who  had  worked  his  way  up 
from  printer's  boy  to  editor — wrote  in  a 
fairly  good  English  style,  with  a  knack  for 
turning  a  sonnet  which  now  and  then  rose 
to  the  dignity  of  real  poetry.  But  he  lack- 
ed intellectual  strength,  and  was  conscious 
of  the  lack.  The  reader  of  this  book  is  im- 
pressed, in  the  pages  from  Garrison's  pen, 
with  the  absence  of  genuine  eloquence,  or 
vigor  of  argument,  or  acuteness  of  observa- 
tion. A  superiority  of  intellectual  and 
moral  tone  is  recognized  at  once,  when  we 
pass  from  a  page  of  Garrison's  writing  to 
a  page  from  Elizur  Wright,  or  even  Lewis 
Tappan.  Now,  what  do  most  men  do  in 
this  case — conscious  that  their  strength  is 
inadequate  to  their  undertaking  ?  They 
are  commonly  tempted  to  make  up  in  vio- 
lence for  the  defect  of  strength.  And  this 
was  the  temptation    to   which    Garrison 


158  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


yielded.  He  was  always  straining  his  voice 
till  it  broke  into  falsetto.  He  might  not 
be  able  to  argue  successfully ;  but  he  could 
scold  like  a  fishwife.  He  might  not  con- 
vict his  adversary  of  wrong;  but  he  could 
pelt  him  with  hard  names.  He  might  not 
be  able  to  command  the  attention  of  the 
people  by  weight  of  character  or  power  of 
language;  but  he  could  infuriate  them  by 
insult.  Here  were  cheap  substitutes  for 
eloquence  always  at  hand,  and  he  had 
small  scruple  about  using  them.  He  might 
not  be  able  to  win  any  large  following  to 
serve  under  him  by  the  attraction  of  his 
genius,  or  the  success  of  his  leadership;  but 
perhaps  some  might  be  intimidated  into 
his  service  by  a  policy  of  systematic  insult. 
So  this  policy  was  deliberately  adopted 
and  persistently  followed.  Probably  it  was 
the  first  instance  of  an  attempt  to  carry 
forward  a  scheme  of  Christian  philanthropy 
in  main  reliance  on  blackmail.  The  bitter- 
est epithets  and  most  damaging  accusations 
in  Mr.  Garrison's  extensive  repertory  were 
applied  to  these  who  were  nearest  him  but 
failed  to  adhere  to  him.  The  one  lower 
grade  of  turpitude  was  that  of  the  men 
who,  having  once  trained  in  his  troop,  de- 
tached themselves  from  it.  The  "worst 
and  most  dangerous   form  of  pro-slavery  " 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  159 

was  to  be  an  anti-slavery  man  outside  of 
Garrison's  residuary  faction.  There  was 
no  lack  of  collaborators  to  whom  the  policy 
of  Garrison  was  congenial,  and  it  was  in- 
dustriously prosecuted.  Faithful  citizens, 
and  especially  Christian  ministers,  were 
studiously  annoyed  with  false  charges  of 
being  "pro-slavery."  Americans  going 
abroad  found  that  a  system  of  correspon- 
dence was  in  operation  by  which  evil  re- 
ports were  sent  in  advance  of  them.  But 
the  delight  of  the  Garrison  press  and  plat- 
form was  to  seize  the  occasion  of  the 
recent  death  of  some  exceptionally  beloved 
and  honored  citizen,  when  hearts  were 
tender,  and  the  wounds  of  bereavement 
not  yet  closed,  to  defile  his  fresh  grave  with 
some  abominable  accusation.  And  down 
almost  to  this  very  day  it  has  been  the 
amiable  practice  of  some  of  the  survivors 
of  that  faction,  notably  of  Mr.  Oliver 
Johnson,  to  signalize  the  departure  of  some 
man  honored  for  his  great  services  in  the 
cause  of  human  freedom,  by  printing  men- 
dacious charges  against  him  of  pro-slavery 
sympathy,  and  sending  them  marked  to 
the  mourners. 

*It  is  only  by  glimpses  between  the  lines 
that  the  reader  of  this  biography  gets  an 
idea  of  the  state   of  public   sentiment  in 


160  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


America  at  the  time  when  Garrison  began 
his  work.  Garrison's  own  reckless  and 
swaggering  account  of  it  is  this: 

"At  that  time  [before  the  beginning  of  The 
Liberator  in  1831]  there  was  scarcely  a  man  in 
all  the  land  who  dared  to  peep  or  mutter  on  the 
subject  of  slavery;  the  pulpit  and  the  press 
were  dumb ;  no  anti-slavery  organizations  were 
made ;  no  public  addresses  were  delivered  ;  no 
reproofs,  no  warnings, no  entreaties  were  uttered 
in  the  ears  of  the  people,  silence,  almost  un- 
broken silence,  prevailed  universally."— [I.  458.] 

In  the  same  ridiculously  false  and  brag- 
gart tone  is  his  talk  about  Channing's  little 
work  on  slavery  :  "  We  do  claim  all  that  is 
sound  or  valuable  in  the  book  as  our  own; 
its  sole  excellences  are  its  moral  plagiar- 
isms; " — [II.  89].  Habitually,  he  abounds 
with  great  swelling  words  of  assumption 
that  he  is  the  very  founder  and  inventor  of 
anti-slavery  feeling,  argument  and  effort. 

And  yet  throughout  the  book,  and  es- 
pecially the  earlier  part  of  it,  we  come  con- 
tinually upon  facts  that  are  only  to  be 
explained  by  supposing  (what  is  the  demon- 
strable truth)  that  Garrison  from  his  child- 
hood grew  up  in  an  atmosphere  of  abhor- 
rence of  slavery — an  atmosphere  which 
pervaded  the  North  and,  to  a  large  ex- 
tent the  South  as  well.  The  really  remark- 
able  and   distinguishing   thing  about  his 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  161 

early  life  is  the  torpid  insensibility  of  his 
own  conscience  on  this  subject,  while  all 
about  him  men  were  feeling  deeply  and 
speaking  and  acting  boldly.  He  had  had 
exceptional  opportunities  of  knowing  sla- 
very in  its  most  hideous  aspect,  in  succes- 
sive visits  to  one  of  the  chief  slave  markets 
of  the  country ;  but  he  took  no  interest  in 
the  matter.  In  the  year  1826,  a  speech  was 
made  in  Congress  by  Mr.  Everett,  which 
seemed  to  apologize  for  slavery;  Mr. 
Gurley,  of  the  Colonization  Society,  Mr. 
Bacon,  and  other  friends  of  the  colored 
people  broke  out  in  indignant  protest  and 
denunciation ;  Mr.  Garrison  copied  the 
speech  into  his  newspaper  without  the 
slightest  sign  of  disapproval. 

When,  at  last,  his  sluggish  conscience 
was  roused  to  recognize  that  slavery  was 
wrong,  and  he  began  to  speak  and  act,  he 
found  that  the  whole  country  was  before- 
hand with  him.  In  the  year  1828,  he  refers, 
in  his  Bennington  newspaper,  to  a  petition 
recently  presented  to  Congress  by  more 
than  a  thousand  residents  of  the  District  of 
Columbia,  including  all  the  District  Judges, 
praying  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the 
District.  And  presently  a  meeting  is  con- 
vened at  the  Bennington  Academy  at 
which  a  petition  for  the  same  object,  drawn 


162  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

by  Garrison's  hand,  is  read  and  adopted, 
which  reads: 

"Your  petitioners  deem  it  unnecessary  to  at- 
tempt to  maintain  by  elaborate  arguments  that 
the  existence  of  slavery  is  highly  detrimental  to 
the  happiness,  peace  and  prosperity  of  that  na- 
tion in  whose  bosom  and  under  whose  auspices 
it  is  nourished  ;  and  especially  that  it  is  incon- 
sistent with  the  spirit  of  our  government  and 
laws.  All  this  is  readily  admitted  by  every 
patriot  and  Christian.  ...  It  is  gratifying  to 
believe  that  a  large  majority  of  the  inhabitants 
of  the  District,  and  also  of  our  more  Southern 
brethren,  are  earnest  for  the  abolition.  .  .  . 
Your  petitioners  deem  it  preposterous  that 
while  there  is  one  half  of  the  States  in  which 
slavery  does  not  exist,  and  while  a  large  majority 
of  our  white  population  are  desirous  of  seeing 
it  extirpated,  this  evil  is  suffered  to  canker  in 
the  vitals  of  the  republic." 

The  petition  was  sent  to  all  the  post- 
masters of  the  State  of  Vermont,  with  the 
request  that  they  would  obtain  signatures 
to  it;  and  most  of  them  "  responded  nobly  "  ; 
so  that  the  document  was  sent  to  Washing- 
ton with  no  less  than  2352  signatures,  and 
there  found  a  nearly  unanimous  resolu- 
tion of  the  Pennsylvania  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives in  favor  of  the  same  object. — 
[I.  109,  110.] 

It  is  this  exact  period  of  which  it  is  im- 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  163 

pudently  declared  (for  the  greater  glory  of 
Garrison) : 

"  Fifty  years  ago  [i.  e.,  in  1829],  it  is  no  ex- 
aggeration to  say,  this  nation,  in  church  and 
state,  from  President  to  boot-black— I  mean  the 
white  boot-black — was  thoroughly  pro-slavery. 
In  the  Sodom  there  might  have  been  a  Lot  or 
two  here  and  there — some  profound  thinker  who 
wished  justice  to  be  done  though  the  heavens 
should  fall,  but  he  was  despondent.  It  seemed 
as  though  nearly  the  whole  business  of  the 
press,  the  pulpit  and  the  theological  seminary 
was  to  reconcile  the  people  to  the  permanent 
degradation  and  slavery  of  the  negro  race." — 
[I.  298.  Quoted  from  a  speech  of  Elizur  Wright, 
in  June,  1879.] 

Who  would  suppose,  from  reading  this 
statement  of  history,  that  Garrison's  boy- 
hood had  passed  in  the  midst  of  an  anti- 
slavery  agitation  that  convulsed  the  nation 
almost  to  the  point  of  civil  war;  or  that  in 
1818  that  noble  act  of  the  Presbyterian 
Church  declaring  slavery  to  be  "a  gross 
violation  of  the  most  precious  and  sacred 
rights  of  human  nature,  utterly  inconsistent 
with  the  law  of  God,  and  totally  irreconcil- 
able with  the  spirit  and  principles  of  the 
gospel  of  Christ,"  had  been  unanimously 
adopted  by  the  General  Assembly,  repre- 
senting North  and  South  ?  The  eulogists 
of  Garrison  will  hardly  have  the  effrontery 
to  claim  that  it  was  from  their  hero  that 


164  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


the  illustrious  Kentuckian,  Robert  J. 
Breckenridge,  learned  either  the  ethics  or 
the  rhetoric  of  that  splendid  invective 
which  he  uttered  in  1833  in  the  pages  of 
the  "  Biblical  Repertory,"  in  which  he  de- 
clared "  slavery  as  it  is  daily  exhibited  in 
every  slave  State  "  to  be  "  a  system  which 
is  utterly  indefensible  on  every  correct 
human  principle,  and  utterly  abhorrent 
from  every  law  of  God";  in  which  rebuk- 
ing the  apologists  of  the  institution  he  ex- 
claims :  "  Out  upon  such  folly  !  The  man 
who  cannot  see  that  involuntary  domestic 
slavery,  as  it  exists  among  us,  is  founded 
on  the  principle  of  taking  by  force  that 
which  is  another's,  has  simply  no  moral 
sense";  .  .  .  "  these  are  reasons  for  a 
Christian  land  to  look  upon  and  then  ask  : 
Can  any  system  which  they  are  advanced 
to  defend  be  compatible  with  virtue  and 
truth?  .  .  .  Hereditary  slavery  is  with- 
out pretence,  except  in  avowed  rapacity." 

Such  views  as  these,  of  a  conspicuous 
leader  of  public  opinion  in  the  slave  States 
in  1833,  instead  of  being,  according  to  the 
preposterous  assumption  of  Mr.  Garrison's 
admirers,  something  unknown  before  his 
advent,  devised  by  his  own  heart,  becom- 
ing prevalent  through  his  propagation  of 
them,  were,  as  a  matter  of  exact  history,  the 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  165 

generally  prevalent  sentiment  of  the  coun- 
try at  the  beginning  of  his  career  ;  and 
the  progressive  decline  of  them,  and,  at 
the  South,  the  practical  extinction  of 
them,  synchronizes  with  the  progress  of 
Mr.  Garrison's  anti-slavery  operations. 
Whether  these  operations  stood  to  the  de- 
cline of  anti-slavery  sentiment  in  the  re- 
lation of  cause  to  effect  is  a  fair  question, 
on  which,  however,  in  our  own  minds,  there 
is  not  a  particle  of  doubt.  It  is  clear  to 
us  that  Mr.  Garrison  and  his  propaganda 
had  no  small  part  in  the  demoralization  of 
public  opinion  which  went  on  to  worse  and 
worse  during  the  period  of  his  greatest 
activity. 

But  while  he  had  no  originality  in  the 
advocacy  of  anti-slavery,  of  emancipation, 
or  of  abolition — on  all  these  points  merely 
accepting  the  general  sentiment  of  good 
men  prevalent  at  the  beginning  of  his 
career — there  were  two  favorite  nostrums 
on  which  he  claimed  exclusive  rights,  at 
least  for  the  American  market ;  one  of  these 
he  labelled  "  immediate  emancipation,"  and 
the  other  "immediate  abolition."  Both  of 
them  were  founded  in  fallacy — that  form  of 
fallacy  which  one  of  his  surviving  disci- 
ples, Mr.  Oliver  Johnson,  with  unconscious 


166  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

humor,  characterized  *  as  "  elastic  defini- 
tion," but  which  is  better  known  to  logicians 
as  "ambiguous   middle."     All   slavehold- 
ing  is  wicked,  said  the  reformer ;  therefore 
every  slaveholder  should  instantly  eman- 
cipate all  his  slaves,  and  until  he  does  so, 
he  is  a  murderer,  a  man-stealer,  a  pirate, 
to  be  excommunicated  from  the  Church, 
and  shunned  by  decent  men.     But  being 
questioned  what  he  would  do  in  the  case 
of  one  who  was  holding  slaves  only  until 
he  could  bring  them  away  to  a  State  where 
the  laws  would  permit  the  emancipation  of 
them,  he  answers  at  once:  "When  I  say 
slaveholding  is  wicked,  I  mean  the  wicked 
kind  of  slaveholding  ;    the  man  you  de- 
scribe holds  slaves,  indeed,  but  he  is  not 
what  I  mean  by  a  slaveholder.     I  have  'an 
elastic  definition'  that  can  be  accommo- 
dated to  all  such  cases."     In  short,  he  fell 
afoul  of  the  English  language ;   his  long 
quarrel  with  the  best  men  of  his  generation 
was  a  contest  in  defence  of  his  indefeasible 
right  to  use  words   out  of  their  proper 
meaning. 

So  with  his  demand  for  "  immediate  ab- 
olition," objection  to  which  filled  him  with 
"inexpressible  abhorrence  and  dismay." 
It   "does  not  mean,"  he  says,  "that  the 

*  Century  Magazine,  vol.  IV.  (1883)  pp.  153,  636. 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  16^ 


slaves  shall  immediately  ...  be  free 
from  the  benevolent  restraints  of  guard- 
ianship."—[I.  294.]  In  short,  when  he 
says  "  immediate  abolition  "  he  means  wh-at 
is  ordinarily  understood  by  "gradual  abo- 
lition," which  if  any  man  dare  to  express 
approval  of,  he  will  belabor  him  with  foul 
words  in  his  Liberator  and  do  what  he 
can  to  injure  him  in  public  estimation. 

With  more  patience  than  this  patent 
fallacy  deserved,  the  sober  anti-slavery 
men  of  this  country  labored  to  clear  excited 
minds  of  the  illusion  which  Garrison  and 
his  followers  persistently  labored  to  main- 
tain.    Said  Leonard  Bacon: 

"As  for  the  thing  which  alone  they  profess 
to  recognize  as  slavery,  we  hold  it  to  be  invari- 
ably sinful.  As  for  the  thing  which,  when  they 
attempt  to  speak  accurately,  they  call  emanci- 
pation, we  hold  it  to  be  the  plainest  and  first 
duty  of  every  master.  As  for  the  thing  which 
they  describe  as  the  meaning  of  immediate 
abolition,  we  hold  it  to  be  not  only  practicable 
and  safe,  but  the  very  first  thing  to  be  done  for 
the  safety  of  a  slaveholding  country.  The  im- 
mediate abolition  against  which  we  protest  as 
perilous  to  the  commonwealth  and  unjust  to 
the  slaves,  is  a  different  thing  from  that  which 
the  immediate  abolitionists  think  they  are  urg- 
ing on  the  country.     .     .     . 

"The  sophism  by  which  they  unwittingly 
impose  on  their  own  minds  and  inflame  the 


168  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


minds  of  others,  is  this :  the  terms  '  slavery, 
♦  slaveholding,'  '  immediate  emancipation,'  etc. 
have  one  meaning  in  their  definitions,  and,  to  a 
great  and  unavoidable  extent,  another  meaning 
in  their  denunciations  and  pjpular  harangues. 
Thus  they  define  a  slaveholder  to  be  one  who 
claims  and  treats  his  fellow-men  as  property — 
as  things— as  destitute  of  all  personal  rights  ; 
one,  in  a  word,  whose  criminality  is  self-evi- 
dent.   But  the  moment  they  begin  to  speak  of 
slaveholders  in  the   way  of   declamation,  the 
word  which  they  have  strained  out  of  its  proper 
import  springs  back  to  its  position,  and  denotes 
any  man  who  stands  in  the  relation  of  over- 
seer and  governor  to  those  whom  the  law  has 
constituted    slaves ;    and    consequently   every 
man  who,  in  the  meaning  of  the  laws,  or  in 
the  meaning  of  common  parlance,  is  a  slave- 
holder, is  denounced  with  unmeasured  expres- 
sions of  abhorrence  and  hate,  as  an  enemy  of 
the  species.    What  is  the  effect  of  this  on  their 
own  minds?     What,  on  the  minds  of  those 
who  happen,  from  one  cause  or  another,  to  be 
ripe  for  factious  or  fanatical  excitement  against 
the  South?    What,  on  the  minds  of  those  who, 
without  unravelling  the  sophistry  of  the  case, 
know  that  many  a  slaveholder  is  conscientious, 
and  does  regard  his  slaves  as  brethren  ?    What, 
on  the  minds  of  those  slaveholders  themselves 
who  are  conscious  of  no  such  criminality  " — 
Quarterly  Christian  Spectator,  1834. 

The  possible  effect  of  his  sophistical  talk 
on  other  men's  minds  seems  not  to  have 
been   veiled   from   Mr.  Garrison.     In  the 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    OABRISON.  169 


retrospect,  at  least,  he  looked  back  with 
complacency   to   the   syllogism  which   he 
had  furnished  to  the  extreme  defenders  of 
slavery  :  "If  human  beings  could  be  justly 
held  in  bondage  for  one  hour,  they  could 
be  for  days  and  weeks  and  years,  and  so 
on  indefinitely  from  generation  to  genera- 
tion."— [I.    140.]      It   was   an  instruction 
which  needed  no  bettering,  to  fit  it  exactly 
to   the  use  of  pro-slavery  men,  North  or 
South,  in  their  conflict  with  the  anti-sla- 
very feeling  that  was  everywhere  dominant 
when   Garrison  began    his  glorious  work. 
But  this  bearing  of  it  seemed  to  be  no  ob- 
jection to  it  in  Mr.  Garrison's  mind;  and 
the  fact  that  it  would  be  exasperating  and 
alienating  to  good,  conscientious  and  anti- 
slavery  men  among  the  slaveholders  was 
vastly  in  its  favor.    His  grievance  with  the 
old  anti-slavery  societies  was  that  thev  did 

m 

not  "personally  arraign  the  slaveholder 
and  hold  him  criminal  for  not  immediately 
emancipating  his  slaves,  and  seek  to  make 
him  odious  and  put  him  beyond  the  pale 
of  intercourse."— [I.  159,  note.  The  lan- 
guage is  the  biographers'.] 

Nothing  in  all  this  book  is  more  truly 
characteristic  of  Mr.  Garrison  than  these 
words  of  his  children.  A  policy  of  reform 
might   be   wise,   effective,   successful ;    it 


170  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

might  have  extinguished  slavery,  as  indeed 
it  had  extinguished  it,  in  State  after  State, 
and  be  moving  hopefully  for  the  like  result 
in  other  States  yet;  but  unless  it  was  per- 
sonally exasperating  it  had  no  charms  for 
him.  He  was  not  exasperated  himself;  and 
he  no  more  believed  every  slaveholder  to 
be  criminal  than  Dr.  Bacon  or  Dr.  Breck- 
enridge  did;  but  with  his  little  contrivance 
of  "  an  elastic  definition "  he  continued, 
with  great  composure  and  equanimity,  to 
pour  out  the  weekly  torrent  of  bitter,  foul, 
insulting  language  with  which  he  succeeded 
in  quenching  the  anti-slavery  sentiment  of 
the  South  to  its  last  embers,  and  infuriat- 
ing an  opposition  to  the  very  name  of  abo- 
litionist, even  in  the  North,  that  showed 
itself  in  the  shameful  mobs  which  he  de- 
lighted to  provoke,  and  which  were  re- 
pressed or  prevented  by  the  efforts  of  men 
for  whom  he  had  no  thanks,  but  only  abuse 
and  calumny.  His  love  of  a  mob  was  not 
in  the  least  like  the  Tipperary  Irishman's 
delight  in  a  shillalah-fight.  It  was  a  mat- 
ter of  policy,  and  in  the  roughest  tumble 
of  it  his  "mind  was  tranquil";  and  when 
it  was  over  he  sat  down  and  footed  up  the 
net  advantages  :  "New  subscribers  to  the 
Liberator  continue  to  come  in — not  less 
than  a  dozen  to-day.    Am  much  obliged  to 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  171 

the  mob." — [II.  50.]  He  was  even  capable  of 
refraining  from  exciting  a  mob  when  he  saw 
no  profit  in  it — "  a  mob  without  doing  us  any 
benefit,  as  the  market  is  now  getting  to  be 
somewhat  glutted  with  deeds  of  violence." 
— [II.  105.]  But  in  general,  he  actually  hun- 
gered for  a  row,  and  labored,  when  he  saw 
the  populace  nearing  the  boiling-point,  to 
throw  in  fresh  provocations,  and  invite 
general  attention  to  his  non-resistance  prin- 
ciples. On  the  eve  of  the  Boston  riot,  he 
was  disgusted  with  the  apparent  lull  of 
popular  excitement  which  threatened  that 
the  storm  would  blow  over.  "  Boston  is 
beginning  to  sink  into  apathy.  The  reac- 
tion has  come  rapidly,  but  we  are  trying 
to  get  the  steam  up  again."  — [II.  2.]  In 
like  manner,  at  the  dedication  of  Pennsyl- 
vania Hall  in  Philadelphia,  his  disgust  at 
the  address  of  David  Paul  Brown,  the  emi- 
nent anti-slavery  lawyer,  was  irrepressible. 
That  address  seemed  adapted  "to  allay,  in 
some  measure,  the  prejudice  that  prevails 
against  us  and  our  holy  cause";  and  that 
was  not  at  all  what  he  had  come  to  Phila- 
delphia for.  There  were  placards  out  incit- 
ing to  a  riot,  and  it  was  an  opportunity  not 
to  be  missed.  The  mob  needed  punching 
up,  and  Garrison  was  just  the  man  to  do  it. 
So  he  took  the  platform  with  some  sneer- 


172  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


ing  and  insulting  remarks  about  Mr.  Brown 
and  his  address,  and  about  men  of  "  cau- 
tion," and  " prudence,"  and  "judicious- 
ness," generally. 

"Sir.  I  have  learned  to  hate  those  words,  .  .  . 
Sir,  slavery  will  not  be  overthrown  without 
excitement,   a  most    tremendous    excitement. 
And  let  me  say  there  is  too  much  quietude  in 
this  city.    It  shows  that  the  upholders  of  this 
wicked   system    have  not  yet  felt  that  their 
favorite  sin  has  been  much  endangered.    You 
need  and  must  have  a  moral  earthquake.  .  .  . 
Your  cause  will  not  prosper  here— the  philosophy 
of  reform  forbids  you  to  expect  it— until  it  ex- 
cites popular  tumult,  and  brings  down  upon  it 
a  shower  of  brickbats  and  rotten  eggs,  and  it  is 
threatened  with  a  coat  of  tar-and-feathers."— 
[II.  215,  216,  note.] 

The  desire  of  Garrison's  heart  was 
promptly  gratified  by  the  smashing  of  the 
windows  and  the  burning  of  the  building ; 
out  of  all  which  he  got  safely  off,  and 
wrote  to  his  mother-in-law  in  high  spirits, 
from  Boston.  "  We  have  had  great  doings 
in  Philadelphia,  during  the  present  week. 
...  It  will  do  incalculable  good  to  our 
cause.  .  .  .  Our  friends  are  all  in  excellent 
spirits,  shouting  Alleluia!  for  the  Lord 
God  omnipotent  reigneth  !    Let  the  earth 

rejoice! 

The  attitude  of  Mr.   Garrison  and  his 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  173 


queer  little  "persecuted  remnant"  of  fol- 
lowers, towards  the  mob,  was  like  that  of 
Messrs.  Dodson  and  Fogg  towards  the 
enraged  Mr.  Pickwick.  "'Perhaps  you 
would  like  to  call  us  swindlers,  sir,'  said 
Dodson.  'Pray  do,  sir,  if  you  feel  dis- 
posed; now  pray  do,  sir.'  '  Go  on,  sir;  do 
go  on,'  added  Mr.  Fogg.  c  You  had  better 
call  us  thieves,  sir;  or  perhaps  you  would 
like  to  assault  one  of  us.  Pray  do  it,  if 
you  would;  we  will  not  make  the  smallest 
resistance.  Pray  do  it,  sir';  and  Fogg  put 
himself  very  temptingly  within  the  reach 
of  Mr.  Pickwick's  clenched  fist." 

The  case  is  not  exactly  in  point.  The  mob 
was  by  no  means  as  innocent  as  Mr.  Pick- 
wick, and  the  abusive  epithets,  to  which 
thief  and  swindler  wrere  terms  of  compli- 
ment,were  rather  bestowed  by  Mr.  Garrison 
than  solicited.  But  Dodson  and  Fogg  never 
equalled  Mr.  Garrison  in  the  cool  studious- 
ness  with  which  he  invited  assault  with 
the  standing  promise  of  impunity,  serenely 
calculating  on  the  ulterior  advantage  of  it. 
He  swaggered  insolently  about  in  the  pan- 
oply of  his  non-resistance  principles,  the 
"  Moral  Bully  "  described  by  Dr.  Holmes : 

"  His  velvet  throat  against  thy  corded  wrist, 
His   loosened   tongue  against   thy  doubled 
fist." 


174  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

"  The  Moral  Bully,  though  he  never  swears, 
Nor  kicks  intruders  down  his  entry  stairs, 
Though  meekness  plants  his  backward-sloping 

hat, 
And  non-resistance  ties  his  white  cravat,  .  •  , 
Hugs  the  same  passion  to  his  narrow  breast ; 
That    heaves    the  cuirass  on    the  trooper's 

chest ; 
Feels  the  same  comfort,  while  his  acrid  words 
Turn  the  sweet  milk  of  kindness  into  curds, 
As  the  scarred  ruffian  of  the  pirate's  deck 
When  his  long  swivel  rakes  the  staggering 

wreck." 

The  lesson  of  Mr.  Garrison's  life,  truly- 
told,  is  instructive  but  sad.  It  is  the  story 
of  the  failure  and  wreck  of  what  could  hard- 
ly, in  any  case,  have  been  a  great  career,  but 
might  have  been  a  wholly  honorable  and 
useful  one.  The  whole  course  of  his  active 
life  is  a  continuous  history  of  opportunities 
wasted,  influence  forfeited,  faithful  friends 
and  benefactors  alienated  and  forced  into 
hostility,  and  friends  that  still  remained 
"  sickened  "  at  the  folly  and  violence  of  his 
language,  and  at  the  irreparable  mischiefs 
wrought  by  it  to  the  cause  which  he  claimed 
for  his  own.  Meanwhile  he  was  embittered 
by  seeing  "enlargement  and  deliverance 
arise  from  another  place."  The  sober,  con- 
scientious, Christian  anti-slaverv  sentiment 
of  the  country  was  clearly  enlightened,  and 
resolutely  and  wisely  led,  by    such  men 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  175 


as  Albert  Barnes,  Leonard  Bacon,  William 
Ellery  Channing  and  Francis  Wayland — 
men  for  whose  persons,  whose  arguments, 
and  whose  measures  Mr.  Garrison  had  no 
words  but  bitter  denunciation  and  insult, 
and  all  the  more  as  he  saw  them  leading 
on  to  success  where  he  had  miserably- 
failed.  The  attempt  to  represent  that  the 
only  consistent  and  sincere  anti-slavery  of 
the  nation  was  confined  to  Garrison  and 
the  infinitesimal  faction  of  his  adherents 
— an  attempt  pertinaciously  prosecuted  by 
him  during  his  lifetime,  and  now  renewed 
since  his  death— needs  to  be  rebuked  in 
the  name  of  public  morality;  and  not  less, 
the  mischievous  lesson  that  is  deduced 
from  this  false  representation,  to  wit,  that 
extravagant  statement,  sweeping  denunci- 
ation and  personal  abuse  of  antagonists 
may  be  relied  on  to  carry  almost  any 
crotchet  of  "reform,"  if  only  they  are 
stuck  to  long  enough. 

The  public  career  of  Mr.  Garrison,  to 
which  we  have  mainly  confined  our  atten- 
tion, is  not  difficult  to  understand.  His 
personal  character  as  exhibited  in  this  book 
would  be  a  more  complicated  study,  very 
interesting,  but  less  important  to  the  world. 
Certain  fine  qualities  he  had  in  a  high  de- 
gree.   His  courage  lacked  nothing,  but  a 


176  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


little  modesty,  of  being  perfect  and  entire; 
but  he  advertised  it  too  much  in  his  news- 
paper. He  was  completely  superior  to 
mercenary  considerations,  and  took  joy- 
fully the  spoiling  of  his  own  goods,  and 
still  more  joyfully  the  spoiling  of  other  peo- 
ple's goods  ;  no  one  of  the  proprietors  of 
Pennsylvania  Hall  seems  to  havee  quailed 
him  in  the  happy  serenity  and  even  hi- 
larity with  which  he  witnessed  the  destruc- 
tion of  that  valuable  property.  For  the 
great  cause  which  he  had  at  heart,  he  was 
willing  to  bear  the  loss  of  friends — so  will- 
ing, in  fact,  that  as  they  turned,  grieved  or 
indignant,  from  his  door,  he  usually  kicked 
them  down  the  steps,  only  not  with  an  actual 
boot  of  leather — that  he  held  to  be  sinful. 
His  sympathy  with  the  slaves  was  deep 
and  sincere;  the  groans  of  their  prolonged 
bondage  were  torture  to  his  soul;  yet  even 
this  torture  he  was  willing  to  bear  cheer- 
fully for  an  indefinite  period  (no  matter 
what  their  preference  might  be)  rather 
than  have  them  emancipated  on  incorrect 
principles  [I.  348,  352] ;  so  far  was  he  from 
being  a  reckless  enthusiast  in  his  humanity. 
Conscious  of  superiority  to  such  vulgar 
forms  of  selfishness,  he  sincerely  thought 
himself  (there  is  much  evidence  of  this, 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  177 


sometimes  pathetic,  sometimes    amusing) 
to  be  a  perfect  man. 

One  is  surprised  and  almost  sorry  to  find 
it  claimed  for  him  that  he  was  not  passionate 
or  vindictive — that  when  he  was  running 
amuck  through  society,  striking  and  stab- 
bing indiscriminately  all  but  those  that  ran 
with  him,  it  was  a  mere  matter  of  policy, 
about  which  he  chatted  "  gladsomely  "  with 
his  friends.     In  like  manner,  we  are  pained 
to  discover  that  he  was  far  from  being  the 
pachyderm  which  his  recklessness  of  the 
feelings  and  reputations  of  others  indicates 
him  to  be.     He  is  sensitive  to  the  pains 
which  he  delights  to  inflict  or  see  inflicted 
on  other  men.     If  he  fairly  chuckles  with 
joy  at  preventing  the  Colonizationists  from 
getting  a  place  for  their  meeting  [I.  450] 
it  is  not  because  he  does  not  go  bemoaning 
the  wickedness  of  the  churches  in  not  being 
willing  to  lend  him  or  his  friends  a  meeting- 
house gratis.     His  devoted  labors  to  make 
other  people  "odious,  and  put  them  beyond 
the  pale  of  intercourse,"  were  compatible 
with  bitter  complaints  that  he  found  he  had 
made  himself  odious  instead.     The  most 
abusive  of  writers  is  continually  grumbling 
at  being  abused.     He  calls  on  John  Breck- 
enridge,  who  loses  his  temper  and  becomes 
"really  abusive";  Garrison  bears  it  with  a 


178  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

grieved  and  injured  spirit,  but  with  angelic 
meekness,  goes  home  and  down  on  his 
knees  for  his  enemy;  and  then  puts  the 
knife  into  him  in  the  next  Liberator  as 
"ferocious  and  diabolical." — [I.  449.] 

Mr.  Garrison's  religious  faith,  through 
the  earlier  period  of  his  life,  seems  genuine, 
deep  and  practical.  Not  Archbishop  Laud, 
nor  Saint  Peter  Arbuez,  gives  evidence  of 
a  more  honest  piety,  or  more  strikingly  il- 
lustrates Isaac  Taylor's  definition  of  fanat- 
icism, as  the  combination  of  the  religious 
sentiment  with  the  malignant  passions. 

For  the  materials  of  this  exposition  of 
the  character  and  career  of  Mr.  Garrison, 
it  has  not  been  necessary  to  go  outside  of 
the  voluminous  biography  written  of  him 
by  his  own  sons.  No  one  can  blame  them 
for  not  having  told  the  whole  story.  They 
have  told  enough  to  make  their  huge  book 
refute  itself.  Can  it  be  wondered  at  that 
they  should  have  walked  backward  laying 
a  garment  upon  both  their  shoulders,  so  as 
not  to  see  their  father's  shame  ?  But 
sooner  or  later  some  severely  just  and  faith- 
ful hand  must  take  up  the  task  of  thorough- 
ly exposing  the  perversions  of  history  that 
have  been  perpetrated  by  a  considerable 
number  of  writers,  for  the  canonization  of 
Garrison.     It   is   in   the  interest  of  good 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  179 


morals  that  he  should  be  known  to  the  next 
generation,  as  he  was  known  to  the  past 
generation,  as  the  systematic,  cold-blooded 
and  unscrupulous  calumniator  of  better 
men  than  himself,  and  the  constant  antag- 
onist of  the  men  and  the  measures  that 
were  most  helpful  (as  the  event  demon- 
strated) to  the  abolition  of  slavery.  That 
his  example  may  not  be  of  evil  influence 
in  the  future,  it  is  needful  that  the  demon- 
strable fact  should  be  publicly  exhibited 
and  proved,  that  good  did  not  come  from 
the  evil  which  he  did  that  good  might  come; 
that  the  cause  which  he  claimed  as  his  own 
was  begun  without  him,  and  went  forward 
to  success  not  because  of  him  but  in  spite 
of  him;  and  that  the  failure  of  his  career — 
a  miserable  failure,  notwithstanding  all 
the  false  glorying  of  his  panegyrists — is 
a  warning  to  any  who  may  hereafter  be 
tempted  of  the  devil  to  follow  him  in  those 
methods  which  won  for  him  the  indelible 
title  of  "malignant  philanthropist."  This 
work  might  well  occupy  a  volume,  or  more 
than  one.  But  something  may  be  accom- 
plished towards  it,  even  within  the  narrow 
limits  of  a  magazine  article. 


180  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


II. 


The  common  account  of  Mr.  Garrison's 
career  is  to  this  effect :  That  he  found  the 
country,  and  especially  the  Christian  Church 
and  ministry,  sunken  in  a  deep  and  criminal 
apathy  concerning  the  condition  of  the 
negro  population  of  America,  both  slave  and 
free;  that  by  his  earnest  and  powerful  ap- 
peals he  succeeded  in  arousing  the  public 
conscience  to  the  sinfulness  of  slavery,  and 
enlisting  its  sympathies  with  his  cause;  that 
the  principles  which  he  enunciated,  the 
measures  which  he  advocated,  and  the  men 
whom  he  drew  around  him  and  organized 
for  action,  became  effective  at  last  of  the 
abolition  of  slavery. 

The  demonstrable  facts  of  history  are 
these  :  At  the  time  of  the  strangely  tardy 
awakening  of  Mr.  Garrison's  conscience  to 
the  wrongfulness  of  slavery,  there  was  a 
generally  prevalent  and  growing  anti- slavery 
sentiment  both  at  the  North  and  at  the 
South,  and  this  sentiment  was  especially 
active  in  the  Christian  Church  and  ministry; 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  181 

it  continued  active  on  the  same  principles 
and  along  similar  lines  of  effort  with  those 
under  which  freedom  had  already  been  se- 
cured to  one-half  of  the  Union,  and  was 
operating  hopefully  in  several  of  the  border 
slave  States;  it  was  effecting  emancipations 
from  year  to  year  by  the  hundred  and  the 
thousand;  it  was  zealous  in  promoting  the 
welfare  of  the  free  blacks.  The  new  princi- 
ples, measures  and  methods  inaugurated  by 
Mr.  Garrison  had  no  effect  on  the  general 
anti-slavery  sentiment  of  the  country  except 
to  defeat  its  enterprises  at  the  North,  and  to 
extinguish  it  at  the  South;  they  procured 
the  abolition  or  mitigation  of  slavery  in  no 
single  State,  and,  so  far  as  known,  the 
emancipation  of  no  single  slave;  the  peace- 
ful, constitutional  and  legal  measures  for  re- 
sisting the  spread  of  slavery  that  were  under- 
taken in  the  interest  of  freedom  were  in 
succession  steadfastly  resisted  by  Mr.  Garri- 
son and  his  men;  the  notable  and  successful 
leaders  in  the  anti- slavery  conflict  were  by 
him,  with  few  exceptions,  discredited  and 
vilified;  when,  in  spite  of  him,  the  advance 
of  slavery  had  been  barred  by  the  colonizing 
of  Kansas,  no  resource  was  left  to  the  friends 
of  slavery  but  secession  and  war;  when  seces- 
sion came,  Mr.  Garrison  took  sides  with  the 
secessionists;  when  war  was  begun,  he  was 


182  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

in  favor  of  surrender.  If  Mr.  Garrison 
could  have  won  the  anti-slavery  people  of 
the  North  into  sympathy  with  his  notions, 
slavery  would  have  been  dominant  to-day 
throughout  the  entire  country.  Unhappily, 
in  alienating  the  people  of  the  country  from 
himself  and  from  his  odious  peculiarities,  he 
alienated  them  also  from  the  cause  which  he 
misrepresented ;  and  succeeded  in  nothing  so 
much  as  in  making  the  very  name  of  aboli- 
tionist to  be  the  object  of  general  detesta- 
tion. 

The  despondency  of  anti-slavery  men  that 
followed  their  defeat  in  the  struggle  over 
the  Missouri  Compromise  was  not  of  long 
continuance.  Already  in  1820  the  pen  of 
Jeremiah  Evarts,  always  ready  and  potent 
in  a  good  cause,  was  busy  in  The  Panoplist, 
showing  that  there  was  no  reason  for  despair 
— that  the  condition  of  the  negro  population 
of  America  was  still  a  legitimate  subject 
of  discussion,  and  the  improvement  of 
their  condition  still  a  legitimate  object  of 
effort  on  the  part  of  patriotic  and  Christian 
men.  The  anti-slavery  sermon  of  the 
younger  Edwards,  republished  by  Mr.  Gur- 
ley,  of  the  Colonization  Society,  was  circu- 
lated both  at  the  North  and  at  the  South. 
In  the  anti-slavery  revival  of  this  period, 
naturally  enough,  Andover  Seminary  largely 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  18*3 

shared.  Of  the  six  essays  contained  in  the 
manuscript  Transactions  of  its  "  Society  of 
Inquiry  Concerning  Missions"  of  this  time, 
not  less  than  four  relate  to  slavery  and  the 
colored  people.  The  first  of  these,  by  R. 
Washburn,  on  the  question,  What  is  the 
duty  of  the  Government,  and  the  duty  of 
Christians,  with  regard  to  slavery  in  the 
United  States  ?  begins  thus: 

"  Perhaps  there  is  not  a  more  marked  fea- 
ture in  the  history  of  modern  benevolent  op- 
erations than  the  efforts  made  in  favor  of  the 
unfortunate  Africans.  Forty  years  ago, 
there  were  few  to  weep  over  the  wrongs  and 
wretchedness  of  slavery;  now  thousands  call 
the  sons  of  Africa  brethren,  thousands  are 
willing  to  devote  their  money  and  their  ef- 
forts to  redeem  them  from  their  long  captivi- 
ty, and  thousands  offer  the  daily  prayer  to 
Him  who  ( hath  made  of  one  blood  all  na- 
tions to  dwell  on  the  face  of  the  earth/  that 
He  would  shorten  the  days  of  darkness  and 
crime,  and  hasten  that  day  of  light  and 
glory  when  oppressions  shall  cease,  and  a 
universal  jubilee  be  proclaimed  for  all  the 
enslaved  of  the  human  family." 

The  long  report  to  that  society,  from  the 
pen  of  Leonard  Bacon,  "  On  the  Black  Pop- 
ulation of  the  United  States,"  containing 
denunciations  of  American  slavery  as  sol- 
emnly severe  as  could  be  expressed  in  lan- 
guage, was  extensively  circulated  in  New 


184  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


England  by  the  Andover  students,  and  its 
severest  anti-slavery  passages  were  repub- 
lished in  Richmond.  Every  Fourth  of  July 
the  most  effective  speakers  among  the  And- 
over students  went  out  into  the  neighboring 
towns  to  advocate  the  cause  of  the  negro 
whether  in  slavery  or  in  nominal  freedom 
The  annual  religious  celebration  of  the 
Fourth  by  some  associated  churches  of  Bos- 
ton, from  the  year  1823  onward,  opened  the 
famous  pulpit  of  Park  Street  to  the  same 
subject,  and  there  Louis  Dwight,  Leonard 
Bacon,  John  Todd  and  others  in  successive 
years  spoke  in  no  uncertain  tones. 

Naturally  enough,  the  young  men  who 
went  forth  from  this  centre  of  anti  slavery 
agitation  did  not  lose  their  love  of  freedom 
in  entering  on  the  pastoral  work.  We  fol- 
low the  course  of  one  of  them,  not  as  ex- 
ceptional but  as  representative  of  the  young 
clergy  of  the  time ;  and  we  choose  our 
example  for  two  reasons,  first,  for  our  spe- 
cial opportunities  of  knowing  his  course, 
and  secondly,  because  his  name  has  been, 
and  is  to  this  day,  systematically  vilified  as 
an  example  of  the  "universal  apathy  on 
the  subject  of  slavery"  prevailing  in  the 
community  and  especially  in  the  Church,  in 
the  days  before  Garrison. 

When  Leonard    Bacon,   at    the    age  of 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  185 

twenty-three,  took  charge  of  the  ancient 
church  at  New  Haven,  in  1825,  one  of  the 
earliest  incidents  of  his  work  was  the  or- 
ganization of  a  club  of  young  men,  some  of 
whose  names  were  destined  to  become  fa- 
mous in  the  great  conflict,  under  the  name 
of  "The  Anti-Slavery  Association."  Out  of 
the  labors  and  studies  of  this  club  grew 
"The  African  Improvement  Society  of 
New  Haven/'  in  which  he  and  his  associ- 
ates toiled  with  eminent  success  for  the  up- 
lifting of  the  colored  people  of  that  city 
from  their  deplorable  degradation. 

In  March,  1826,  his  friend  Mr.  Gurley, 
of  the  Colonization  Society,  wrote  to  him 
indignantly  from  Washington,  of  a  speech 
of  Mr.  Everett's  which  he  had  just  heard, 
apologizing  for  slavery.  Said  Mr.  Gurley, 
"If  he  dares  to  publish  these  sentiments, 
which  go  to  sustain  a  most  iniquitous  sys- 
tem, our  friends  at  the  North  must  not  be 
silent."  They  were  not  silent.  Mr.  Ba- 
con's Fourth  of  July  sermon  of  that  year, 
from  the  text,  "Cry  aloud;  spare  not ;  lift 
up  thy  voice  like  a  trumpet,  and  show  my 
people  their  transgressions,"  declared  it  to 
be  "the  duty  of  every  citizen  of  the  United 
States  to  promote  by  every  means  in  his 
power  tire  abolition  of  slavery";  and  con- 
tinued : 


186  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

"  Public  opinion  throughout  the  free 
States  must  hold  a  different  course  on 
the  subject  of  slavery  from  that  which  it 
now  holds.  Instead  of  exhausting  itself 
fruitlessly  and  worse  than  fruitlessly  upon 
the  operation  of  the  system,  it  must  be  di- 
rected towards  the  principle  on  which  the 
system  rests.  It  must  become  such  that  on 
the  one  hand  the  man  who  indulges  his 
malignity  or  ins  thoughtlessness  in  so  ex- 
aggerating the  evils  attendant  on  the  opera- 
tion of  the  system  as  to  implicate  the  body 
of  the  slaveholders  in  the  charge  of  cruelty 
and  tyranny  shall  feel  himself  rebuked  and 
shamed  by  the  nobler  spirit  that  pervades 
his  fellow -citizens ;  and  such  that  on  the 
other  hand  the  man  who  dares  to  stand  up 
in  Congress  and,  presuming  on  the  for- 
bearance of  those  who  sent  him,  attempts  to 
purchase  popularity  by  defending  the  prin- 
ciple of  slavery,  shall  find  himself  greeted 
on  his  return  to  his  constituents  with  one 
loud  burst  of  indignation  and  reproof." 

There  was  nothing  startling  in  these 
views  of  the  young  preacher;  they  were  the 
common  opinions  of  the  American  Church 
at  that  time.  He  himself  testified  forty 
years  later  :  "  From  the  beginning  of  my 
official  ministry,  I  spoke  without  reserve, 
from  the  pulpit  and  elsewhere,  against 
slavery  as  a  wrong  and  a  curse,  threatening 
disaster  and  ruin  to  the  nation.  Many  years 
I  did  this  without  being  blamed,  except  as  I 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  187 


was  blamed  for  not  going  far  enough.  Not 
a  dog  dared  to  wag  his  tongue  at  me  for 
speaking  against  slavery." 

It  is  an  instructive  fact  already  adverted 
to,  that  when  the  speech  that  so  stirred  the 
indignation  of  these  two  colonizationists 
reached  Mr.  Garrison  in  his  editorial  office, 
he  found  nothing  in  it  to  object  to;  he 
thought  it  a  good  speech,  and  printed  it 
accordingly.  He  was  at  the  time  much  con- 
cerned about  the  oppression  of  the  Greeks. 
There  does  seem  to  have  been  "  apathy » 
somewhere,  in  those  days. 

A  favorite  plan  of  the  young  men  at  An- 
dover  was  the  scheme  of  a  college  for  the 
liberal  education  of  colored  youth.      The 
scheme  seems  to  have  been  first  publicly  an- 
nounced by  Mr.  Bacon  when,  at  the  age  of 
barely  twenty-one,  he  urged  it  on  the  support 
of  the  Colonization  Society  at  Washington  in 
1823.     It  was  set  forth  more  publicly  yet  in 
his  "  Plea  for  Africa "  from   Park   Street 
pulpit  in  1824,  and  at  New  Haven  in  1825. 
It  was  much  in  his  thoughts  and  in  his 
letters.     It  met  with  a  painful  discourage- 
ment in  the  early  death  of  Samuel  Hooker 
Cowles,  one  of  that  circle  of  young  Andover 
abolitionists,  who  was  "willing  to  lend  his 
hand  to  "any  measure  which  prudence  and 
philanthropy    might    dictate,"   but    whose 


188  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


cherished  plan,  as  expressed  in  a  biographi- 
cal sketch  in  The  Christian  Spectator  (1828, 
p.  4),  was  "  the  establishment  of  an  African 
college,  where  youth  were  to  be  educated 
on  a  scale  so  liberal  as  to  place  them  on  a 
level  with  other  men,  and  fit  them  for  ex- 
tensive usefulness  to  their  brethren,  either 
in  this  country  or  in  the  colonies."  Not 
only  in  Andover  was  the  plan  taken  up  with 
eagerness.  President  Griffin,  of  Williams 
College,  was  its  enthusiastic  friend.  Theo- 
dore Woolsey  was  earnest  and  wise  in  coun- 
sel about  it ;  and  his  friend  Ridgely  wrote 
to  Woolsey  and  Bacon:. 

"I  am  delighted  with  the  idea  of  calling  a 
general  meeting  at  New  York  to  deliberate 
about  the  practicability  of  establishing  a  Ne- 
gro University.  The  necessities  of  Africa  cry 
aloud  for  some  such  institution.  Her  chil- 
dren are  starving  for  the  bread  of  knowledge. 
They  must  have  it.  It  is  my  opinion  that 
twenty  well  educated  and  accomplished 
young  negro  gentlemen  (I  hope  you  are  pre- 
pared for  the  unusual  association  of  terms) 
would  do  more  for  that  forlorn  and  outcast 
race  than  all  that  has  been  yet  accomplished 
by  their  distinguished  benefactors  at  Wash- 
ington.    It  would  go  far  to  dignify  the 


name." 


Already,  in  the  summer  of  1825,  the  proj- 
ect had  been  talked  over  in  the  little  Anti- 
Slavery  Association  at  New  Haven.     It  is 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  189 


needless  to  detail  here  the  encouragements 
and  the  delays  that  it  met  with.  At  last, 
however,  in  the  summer  of  1829,  the  well- 
matured  plan  of  the  institution  was  submit- 
ted to  a  circle  of  leading  citizens  of  New 
Haven,  especially  those  connected  with  Yale 
College,  and  was  cordially  approved.  A 
large  conditional  subscription  towards  it  was 
made  by  a  member  of  Mr.  Bacon's  congrega- 
tion, and  the  scheme  which  for  more  than 
six  years  had  been  actively  promoted  by  the 
friends  of  the  negro  race  seemed  in  a  fair 
way  to  be  realized. 

We  have  spoken  at  such  length  of  the 
work  done  at  New  Haven  as  being  an  ex- 
ample of  the  humane  and  kindly  work  that 
was  going  on  with  increasing  zeal  and  suc- 
cess throughout  the  North.  There  was  not 
to  be  found  in  all  the  Free  States  a  consider- 
able city  without  its  Clarkson  Society  or  its 
African  Improvement  Society  intent  on  simi- 
lar labors.  And  the  men  and  women  who 
gladly  gave  their  time,  money  and  influence 
to  promote  this  work  were  everywhere  the 
earnest  friends  of  that  enterprise  of  African 
colonization,  one  great  argument  for  which 
was  its  tendency  to  elevate  the  free  colored 
people  in  America,  and  another  great  argu- 
ment, its  tendency  to  promote  emancipation 
and  the  abolition  of  slavery.* 

*  Christian  Spectator,  II.  470-482,  524;    IV.  318-334;    V. 
163-168. 


190  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

At  this  juncture,  in  that  series  of  Fourth 
of  July  discourses  in  which  Mr.  Bacon  five 
years  before  had  delivered  his  "  Plea  for 
Africa,"  Mr.  Garrison  makes  his  tardy  en- 
trance as  an  anti-slavery  orator.  The  most 
notable  characteristic  of  his  discourse  is  the 
extravagance  of  his  zeal  for  colonization.  It 
was  the  one  door  of  hope  for  the  African 
race.  It  was  to  accomplish  instantaneous 
wonders.  But  except  for  this  and  for  his 
wild  suggestion  that  the  colored  population 
of  the  country  should  be  deported  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  federal  government,  it  does  not 
appear  that  his  speech  differed  materially 
from  the  half-dozen  anti-slavery  discourses 
that  had  preceded  his  in  the  same  series. 
His  impression  that  he  was  alone  and  pecul- 
iar in  his  sympathy  for  the  blacks,  "over 
whose  sufferings  scarcely  an  eye  weeps,  or  a 
heart  melts,  or  a  tongue  pleads  either  to  God 
or  man,"  was  simply  one  of  his  constitution- 
al eccentricities. 

Coming  forth  in  the  summer  of  1830  from 
his  brief  imprisonment  in  Baltimore  jail,  he 
made  a  progress  through  the  northern  cities 
in  his  character  of  martyr  to  the  rights  of 
the  negro,  making  addresses  to  such  meet- 
ings of  the  colored  people  as  he  was  able  to 
gather.  Poor,  ignorant,  facile  creatures, 
they  were  the  ready  victims  of  any  dema- 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  191 


gogue  who  should  cajole  them  with  flatter- 
ies, or  intoxicate  them  with  silly  expecta- 
tions,   or  irritate  their  vindictive  passions 
These  things  Mr.  Garrison  was  not  ashamed 
to  do,  poisoning  the  minds  of  the  colored 
people  against  the  benefactors  who  had  done 
so  much  for  them,  and  were  on  the  point  of 
doing  so  much  more,  by  representing  that 
these  were  in  a  dark  plot  to  keep  them  in 
ignorance  and  degradation.*     The  mischief 
that  he  wrought  in  thus  defeating  the  fair- 
est hopes  then  open  before  that  injured  peo- 
ple is  not  to  be  computed.     The  story  of 
how,  in  unconscious  coalition  with  the  baser 
passions  of  the  populace,  he   brought  the 
noble  enterprise  of  the  African  College  to 
wreck  is  too  long  to  tell  at  this  time.     He 
succeeded  in  identifying  it,  in  the  public 
mind,  with  his  own  pernicious  teachings,  and 
it  was  swept  away  by  the  shameful  panic 

*  Address  to  the  Free  People  of  Color,  by  W  L  Garrison 
Review  of  the  same,  Christian  SpectaL   IV311 t£ 
results  of   careful   inquiry  into  the  nSnft'ifi: 
Pie  set  before  the  charita&e I  public  to  to  cite to SaZ 

So\^he^ftha^?1Ie\W^re  qUOted  t0 '  ^e'blSs  to 
snow  tnem  that     those  who  have  entered  into  this  can 

spiracy  against  human  rights  [the   colon  zatior Tenter 

wifoS^eniLiTiS1^  CrUSade  afainst  ionization 
xISLiEz    mu ePlsode  ln  his  career,  and  need  not  be  hero 

« Tho^ntsTnn  rf^r^n^  fa!Iacie*  and  falsehoods  in  hil 
JJJ". on  Colonization »'  (perhaps  the  most  dishonest 
piece  of  polemic  ever  written)  were  exposed  in  the  Chrts 
tian  Spectator,  V.  145 ;  but  this  did  not  hinder  their -be 
in-  repeated  over  and  over  for  the  good  of  the  caSse  as 
they  are  still  repeated  for  the  falsification  of  hiltoJv     sS 
O.  Johnson's  «  Garrison  and  His  Times,"  104  109     y" 


192  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

resolutions  of  a  New  Haven  city  meeting, 
but  not  without  repeated  solemn  and  in- 
dignant protests  from  Mr.  Bacon,  who  lost 
in  that  ruin  the  hopes  and  patient  labors  of 
seven  years.* 

We  must  pass,  rapidly,  point  by  point, 
over  the  chief  points  on  which  Mr.  Garri- 
son fought  against  the  anti-slavery  cause, 
taking  sides  with  its  enemies. 

As  we  have  already  seen,  the  stronghold 
of  anti-slavery  sentiment  was  in  the  Churches. 
In  the  progress  of  that  pro-slavery  reaction 
which  began  with  Mr.  Garrison's  movement 
and  moved  parallel  with  it,  growing  with  its 
growth  and  strengthening  with  its  strength, 
those  men  did  the  noblest  service  to  the 
cause  of  freedom  who  labored  to  hold  the 
Churches  to  their  principles.  But  they  got 
no  help  from  Mr.  Garrison — only  sneers  and 
discouragements.  His  effort  was  just  the 
opposite — to  get  all  the  anti- slavery  men  out 
of  the  Church,  and  turn  the  whole  influence 
of  that  institution  over  to  the  enemy.  For 
this  purpose,  he,  and  his  confederates  with 
his  smiling  encouragement,  assailed  it  with 

*See  The  Religious  Intelligencer  (New  Haven),  September 
and  October,  1831.  The  editorial  comments  on  this  sub- 
ject were  well  known  to  be  from  Mr.  Bacon's  pen.  The 
story  of  this  affair  as  told  by  Mr.  Garrison's  disciples 
makes  the  plan  of  an  African  College  to  have  been  an  en- 
terprise of  "the  Abolitionists"  first  broached  two  years 
before  by  good  Mr.  Jocelyn,  and  defeated  with  the  guilty 
connivance  and  cowardice  of  Mr.  Bacon.  See  "  Garrison 
and  His  Times,"  119-124.    "  Life  of  Garrison,"  I.  259. 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARFISON.  193 


unprintable  vilifications,  delighted  if  there- 
by they  could  draw  a  disorderly  crowd,  to 
their  meeting.  As  this  went  on,  the  best 
men  among  his  adherents  left  him  in  dis- 
gust, and  among  those  who  remained  were 
some  who  saw  how  suicidal  was  this  course, 
and  sought  to  arrest  it,  but  were  answered 
with    defiance.*     Was  it  strange  that  this 

*At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  Massachusetts  Anti- 
Slavery  Society  in  1842,  Mr.  Pierce,  of  Lexington,  moved 
the  following  resolutions: 

Resolved,  As  the  sense  of  this  meeting,  that  it  is  not  by 
the  use  of  opprobrious  epithets  and  harsh  and  sweeping 
denunciations,  but  by  speaking  the  truth  in  love,  that 
abolitionists  will  best  promote  the  cause  of  justice  and 
truth. 

Resolved,  As  the  sense  of  this  meeting,  that  in  their 
writings,  public  discussions  and  private  conversations 
abolitionists  should  refrain  from  the  indiscriminate  cen- 
sure and  denunciation  of  whole  classes  and  associations  of 
persons,  as  the  clergy  and  churches  of  various  denomina- 
tions, and  all  those  whoref  use  to  unite  with  them  regarding 
such  censure  and  denunciation,  as  unjust  and  hhrhlv  in?- 
politic.  J 

Resolved,  As  the  sense  of  this  meeting,  that  the  propos- 
ing, advocating  or  sustaining  such  resolutions  as  the  fol- 
lowing (which  were  discussed  at  a  recent  anti-slaverv 
meeting),  "that  the  religion  of  the  United  States  of 
America  is  one  vast  system  of  atheism  and  idolatry,  which 
in  atrocity  and  vileness  equals  that  of  any  system  in  the 
heathen  countries  of  Asia  or  Africa  or  the  islands  of  the 
Pacific  Ocean  ";  »« that  the  sectarian  churches  and  min- 
istry of  this  country  are  combinations  of  thieves,  adulter- 
ers and  pirates,  and  not  the  churches  and  ministers  of 
Jesus  Christ,  and  should  be  treated  as  brothels  and  ban- 
ditti by  all  who  would  exculpate  themselves  from  the 
guilt  of  slaveholdiug  ;  "  "that  any  man  who  goes  to  the 
polls  and  votes  for  a  slave-owner  or  any  other  than  an 
outspoken  abolitionist,  acts  on  the  same  principle  with  the 
Algerian  buccaneer,  and  ought  not  to  be  recognized  as  an 
abolitionist"— manifests  a  spirit  which,  if  at  all  consistent 
with  the  spirit  of  the  Gospel,  is  not  likelv  to  gain  friends  to 
the  anti-slavery  enterprise,  but  bring*  upon  it  needless 
odium. 

The  quotations  are  a  characteristic  specimen  of  what 
used  to  pass  for  "eloquence  "  on  Mr.  Garrison's  platforms 

Naturally,  Mr.  Pierce's  resolutions  were  promptly  laid 
upon  the  table;  but  when,  two  years  after,  Mr.  Garrison 
moved  that  "the  American  Church  was  a  synagogue  of 
Satan,''  there  was,  of  course,  no  hesitation  about  "resolv- 
ing 'it. 


194  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 


mad  policy  should  have  been  so  far  success- 
ful as  to  inspire  many  good  people  in  the 
Churches  with  a  violent  antipathy  to  the 
very  name  of  anti-slavery  or  abolition  ? 

One  of  the  first  conflicts  in  the  struggle 
against  the  insolent  aggressions  of  the  slave 
power  was  to  secure  the  recognition  in  Con- 
gress of  the  rights  to  which  freedom  was 
entitled  under  the  Constitution  and  existing 
laws.  The  battle  for  the  right  of  petition 
was  fought  out  in  the  House  of  Representa- 
tives with  splendid  ability  and  heroic  cour- 
age and  endurance  by  John  Quincy  Adams. 
That  good  fight  of  his,  single-handed  against 
the  crowd,  is  the  finest  chapter  in  our  par- 
liamentary history.  The  noble  and  venera- 
ble "  old  man  eloquent/'  at  the  outset  of  the 
fight,  was  brutally  stigmatized  in  the  Liber- 
ator as  "a  dough -face." 

The  conflict  was  renewed  again  in  the  per- 
ilous days  of  1851.  That  was  a  great  day  for 
liberty  when  Charles  Sumner,  elected  to  the 
Senate  without  the  support  of  the  Abolition- 
ists and  in  spite  of  their  efforts  to  defeat 
him,  pronounced  his  masterly  argument, 
"Freedom  National:  Slavery  Sectional." 
This  noble  speech,which  did  so  much  towards 
bringing  the  nation  back  to  its  old  bearings, 
and  which  struck  the  keynote  of  the  march 
of  the  Republican  party  to  its  final  success 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  195 

under  the  lead  of  Lincoln,  was  denounced 
by  Mr.  Garrison  in  a  resolution  as  "false 
and  absurd,  and  an  outrage  on  common 
sense/'*  The  little  band  of  faithful  men  at 
the  Capitol,  the  forlorn-hope  of  Freedom  in 
her  darkest  hour — Seward,  Sumner,  Hale, 
Giddings,  and  the  rest — were  insulted,  derid- 
ed, discredited  in  the  name  of  anti-slavery. 

It  was  not  in  vain  that  these  losing  fights 
were  fought  out  in  the  Houses  of  Congress. 
But  the  debate  had  to  be  held  in  a  wider 
forum,  and  decided  by  the  people.  At  the 
first  Mr.  Garrison  had  been  impatient  to 
persuade  or  drive  men  to  the  polls  in  an 
anti-slavery  party.  When,  at  last,  the  first 
beginnings  of  such  action  were  taken  (per- 
haps prematurely — there  was  a  divided  judg- 
ment among  earnest  men  about  that),  they 
encountered  Garrison's  bitter  mockery  and 
denunciation.  It  was  Eesolved  that  a  third 
political  party  is  "fraught  with  unmitigated 
evil  and  mischief  to  the  abolition  enterprise. " 
Those  who  sympathized  with  the   effort — 

*  As  usual  in  his  extravagances,  Mr.  Garrison  had  begun 
by  being  preposterously  extravagant  on  the  other  side  of 
the  question.  In  his  Address  to  the  Free  People  f  Color, 
1831,  he  had  gravely  advised  his  unfortunate  clients  that 
all  the  disabilities  which  they  were  suffering  from  un- 
friendly State  laws  could  be  swept  away  at  one  stroke  by 
simply  carrying  a  case  up  to  the  Supreme  Court.from  which 
august  tribunal  they  might  "  walk  abroad  in  majesty  and 
strength,  free  as  the  air  of  heaven,  sacred  as  the  persons 
of  kings-." 


196  WILLIAM   LLOYD    GARRISON. 


such  men  as  Birney,  Hale,  Leavitt,  Whittier, 
Lewis  Tappan — were  made  the  targets  of 
his  contumely.  No1;  only  their  persons,  but 
in  every  important  issue  their  cause,  found 
in  him  an  ill-wisher  and  an  enemy.  When 
freedom  and  slavery  were  in  the  grapple  over 
the  annexation  of  Texas,  for  all  his  stormy 
speeches  about  the  wickedness  of  that  meas- 
ure, he  lent  no  hand  to  prevent  it,  but  hoped 
that  "the  slave  power  might  become  more 
and  more  severe, "  so  as  to  bring  to  pass  the 
horrors  of  that  disunion  which  he  was  always 
coveting.  He  would  dissuade  anti-slavery 
voters  from  their  duty  as  citizens,  and  deliv- 
er the  question  over  to  be  decided  by  the 
enemies  of  freedom. 

The  war  with  Mexico  was  finished,  and  the 
question  rose  before  the  nation,  what  should 
be  the  destiny  of  the  territories  acquired 
from  the  neighbor  republic.  Freedom  was 
never,  in  all  the  history  of  this  conflict,  so 
near  a  great,  peaceful,  and  decisive  victory 
as  when  the  Wilmot  Proviso,  consecrating 
all  that  domain  to  free  labor,  was  at  issue. 
While  good  citizens  were  bending  their  en- 
ergies to  the  struggle,  the  bird  of  ill  omen 
kept  croaking  his  discouragements.  There 
was  no  hope;  the  nation  must  go  on  to  dis- 
grace and  ruin;  slavery  must  of  necessity  be 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  197 

triumphant;  it  is  too  late  for  reform;  there 
is  no  remedy  but  revolution.* 

The  party  of  Free  Soil  kept  growing  in 
importance;  but  Mr.  Phillips  moved,  and 
the  Anti-Slavery  Society  voted  (1843),  that 
it  was  ' '  a  misdirection  and  waste  of  effort, 
and  attempt  at  impossibilities. ':  Like  both 
the  old  parties,  it  was  "essentially  pro- 
slavery.  "  The  party  adopted  the  bold  and 
wise  measure  of  planting  an  anti-slavery  jour- 
nal, The  National  Era,  at  the  City  of  Wash- 
ington, under  Dr.  Bailey,  Amos  A.  Phelps, 
and  John  G.  Whittier  as  editors.  But  slave- 
holders were  assured  that  "  if  they  knew  the 
party  and  the  editors,  they  would  be  relieved 
of  all  alarm.' :  The  sneers  at  Whittier  might 
be  justified  on  the  ground  of  his  having  left 
the  noisy  camp  of  Mr.  Garrison,  and  of  the 
necessity  of  maintaining  discipline  by  shoot- 
ing deserters;  but  it  could  have  been  only 
the  love  of  vituperation  for  its  own  sake  that 
led  to  the  denouncing  of  Longfellow  for  hav- 
ing in  his  noble  lyric  "  The  Building  of  the 
Ship,"  "  prostituted  his  fine  genius  to  eulo- 
gize the  blood-stained  American  Union.  ,?f 

The  turning-point  in  the  long  fight  with 

*  Mass.  A.  S.  Report,  1847,  p.  10. 

t  The  quotations  are  from  the  Mass.  A.  S.  Reports.  Page 
after  page  these  Reports  are  a  continuous  illustration  of 
Mr.  Garrison's  constancy  in  getting  upon  the  wrong  Bide 
of  every  question  affecting  the  cause  of  liberty,  and  abus- 
ing every  one  that  was  doing  any  useful  work  on  the  right 
side. 


198  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

the  slave  power  was  reached  when,  after  the 
perfidy  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska  Bill  had 
been  consummated,  and  at  the  moment  of 
the  almost  despair  of  the  friends  of  freedom, 
Eli  Thayer,  with  heroic  hopefulness  and 
magnificent  energy  and  ability,  colonized 
Kansas  with  free  settlers,  and  blocked  the 
further  extension  of  slavery.  It  is  an  al- 
most incredible  fact,  and  yet  a  fact,  that 
Mr.  Garrison  and  his  little  residuum  of 
noisy  followers  did  discourage  and  do  what 
they  could  to  defeat  that  noble,  lawful  and 
peaceful  enterprise  which  gave  checkmate 
to  slavery  and  saved  the  continent  for  free- 
dom. The  story  is  authentically  told  by 
Mr.  Thayer's  own  lively  pen  in  "The  Kan- 
sas Crusade." 

It  was  in  the  flush  of  this  triumph  that 
the  election  of  Lincoln  was  achieved  in 
1860.  Both  the  platform  and  the  candi- 
date of  the  Republican  party  were  in  direct 
antagonism  with  every  item  of  Mr.  Garri- 
son's distinctive  principles.*  And  he  was 
merely  consistent  with  his  principles  in  re- 

*Mr.  Lincoln  repeatedly  acknowledged  his  indebtedness 
for  his  definite  convictions  on  the  subject  of  slavery  to 
the  volume  of  Essays  on  Slavery  by  Leonard  Bacon, 
which  had  fallen  into  his  hands  when  he  was  a  young 
man.  The  little  book,  now  rare,  is  directed  on  the  one 
hand  against  slavery,  and  on  the  other  hand  against  that 
type  of  abolitionism  represented  by  Mr.  Garrison.  It  is 
from  the  preface  to  this  book  that  Lincoln  borrowed  his 
much-quoted  phrase,  "If  slavery  is  not  wrong,  then  noth- 
ing is  wrong." 


WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON.  199 

fusing  approval  to  the  party,  and  consistent 
with  his  usages  of  speech  in  characterizing 
Abraham  Lincoln  as  a  "  slave-hound. ':  The 
helpers  and  counsellors  of  the  great  Emanci- 
pator, Chase,  Seward,  Sumner,  Wilson, 
Wade,  and  the  rest  were  subjected  to  like 
contumely. 

Secession,  long  threatened,  came  at  last, 
and  found  its  friends  and  supporters,  at 
the  North,  in  Mr.  Garrison  and  his  little 
company.  For  many  years  the  sagacious 
plan  of  Mr.  Garrison  had  been  identical 
with  that  of  the  Southern  conspirators — 
though  he  expressed  it  differently — the 
founding  of  an  independent,  warlike,  ag- 
gressive nation  wholly  devoted  to  slavery 
and  occupying  as  its  own  the  larger  half  of 
the  domain  of  the  Union,  with  as  much 
more  to  the  south  and  to  the  north  as  it 
might  be  able  to  seize  and  hold.  It  was 
part  of  his  plan  that  the  new  nation  should 
be  started  "peacefully/'  with  every  oppor- 
tunity for  strengthening  itself  in  arms  and 
alliances  until  it  should  be  ready  for  offen- 
sive operations  ;  and  (if  he  could  have  his 
way  about  it)  that  the  residuary  northern 
nation  should  be  organized  on  non-resistant 
principles,  defending  itself  from  its  fierce 
neighbor  only  by  the  arms  of  love.  A 
program  more  charming  to  the  friends  of 


200  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

slavery  it  is  impossible  to  conceive.     That 
they  did    not  accept    the   treasonable  in- 
vitation   of  abolitionist    conventions    to  a 
"  free  correspondence  with  the  disunionists 
of  the  South,  in  order  to  devise  the  most 
suitable  way  and  means  to  secure  the  con- 
summation so  devoutly  to    be  wished,"  * 
could  only  have  been  because  they  knew 
how  contemptibly  insignificant  was  the  fac- 
tion from  which  the  invitation  proceeded. 
But  if  they  had  counted  on  what  support 
the  faction  could  give,  they  did  not  count 
in    vain.      "To    think    of  whipping    the 
South,"  said    Mr.    Garrison,    "is    utterly 
chimerical;"  and  he  proposed  to  say  to  the 
slave  States:  "Depart  in  peace.     Though 
you  have  laid  piratical  hands  upon  property 
not  your  own,  we  surrender  it  all  in  the 
spirit  of  magnanimity ;  and  if  nothing  but 
the   possession  of  the  capital  will   appease 
you,  take  even  that  without  a  struggle."  f 
On  practical   questions  he  was   in   cordial 
agreement  with   Davis    and    Toombs    and 
Yancey  and  their  confederates. 

It  is  a  most  pleasant  thing  to  record  that 
the  awful  shock  of  war,  when  it  came,  did 
at  last  sober  the  chronic  madness  of  the 
man.     By  his  antecedents  he  was  committed 

*  Resolution  adopted  at  New  York,  December,  1859. 
t  Liberator,  xxxi.  27. 


WILLIAM   LLOYD   GARRISON.  201 


"against  all  wars  aud  all  preparations  for 
war;  against  every  naval  ship,  every  arsenal, 
every  fortification;  .  .  .  against  all  appropria- 
tions for  the  defence  of  a  nation  by  force 
and  arms."  *     But  now,  to  the  astonishment 
of  good  citizens  and  the  dismay  of  his  old 
associates,  he  boldly  turned  his  back  upon 
himself,  and  rendered  to  the  imperilled  gov- 
ernment and  nation  the  best  service  in  his 
power.     There  is  nothing  in  all  his  career 
so  honorable  as  his  unfaithfulness,  at  this 
juncture,  to  his  foolish  so-called  principles. 
According  to  these  principles,  the  business 
of  soldier  was  simple,  unmitigated  murder; 
but  when  his  son  starts  for  the  war  as  officer 
in  a  colored  regiment,  he  sends  him  off  with 
his  blessing  for  being  true  to  his  convictions, 
though  regretting  that  these  convictions  are 
morally  unsound,  f     War  and  slavery,  in  Mr. 
Garrison's  view,  were  under  like  and  equal 
condemnation.     If  affairs  at  that  time  had 
been  on   the   old   footing,  and  young  Mr. 
Garrison   had    conscientiously   believed,   as 
many  conscientious  persons  in  the  old  times 
certainly  did  believe,  that  duty  called  him 
to  be  a  faithful  and  humane  master  of  slaves, 
it  would  have  been  a  most  pleasing  and  edi- 
fying spectacle  to  see  the  Reformer  waving 
a  parting  salute  to  the  young  man  as  he 

*  "  Life  of  Garrison,"  ii.  231.  t H  Life  of  Garrison,"  iv.  84. 


202  WILLIAM    LLOYD    GARRISON. 

started  for  his  plantation,  saying,  "  I  could 
have  wished  that  you  could  see  the  matter 
as  I  do,  but  since  you  are  faithful  to  your 
own  convictions,  God  bless  you,  my  boy." 
Unfortunately  this  degree  of  considerateness 
for  the  conscientious  convictions  of  others, 
which  Mr.  Garrison  so  amiably  manifested 
towards  his  own  son,  was  not  developed  in 
his  moral  constitution  early  enough  to  save 
him  from  many  painful  and  mischievous 
mistakes  in  his  behavior  towards  other  peo- 
ple's sons. 

After  all,  Mr.  Garrison  did  really,  at  the 
eleventh  hour,  come  into  the  vineyard  and 
take  his  place  among  those  who  had  spent 
the  heat  of  the  day  in  practically  useful  and 
effective  labors  for  the  cause  of  human  free- 
dom; and  who  shall  grudge  him  the  remark- 
ably large  pennyworth  of  credit  that  he  gets 
for  it  ?  It  does,  nevertheless,  seem  to  be  a 
public  duty  of  considerable  importance  to 
correct  some  of  the  perversions  of  history 
that  are  attempted  for  his  canonization.  We 
have  no  ignoble  discontent  at  hearing  Aris- 
tides  called  The  Just,  no  matter  how  fre- 
quently; but  when  it  comes  to  a  settled  plan 
to  keep  calling  Themistocles  The  Just,  the 
case  is  different. 


CONCERNING  THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS 
AT  GENEVA 


CONCERNING   THE   USE  OF 
FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 


Fagot  is  one  of  that  large  class  of  com- 
mon words  that  grow  familiar  to   Amer- 
icans  in   literature,    but  the   meaning  of 
which  is  not  distinctly  realized  to  the  senses 
till  we  go  abroad.     To  make  sensible  ac- 
quaintance with  commonplace  objects  that 
one  has  known  from    childhood  only  by 
name  is  one  of  the  delights  of  travel,  as 
much  as  the  seeing  of  famous  places  and 
pictures  and  buildings;  and  I  believe  that 
it  is  partly  because  they  have  so  much 
more  of  this  to  do,  that  Americans  are,  be- 
yond other   nations,  enthusiastic   and   de- 
lighted travellers.    Doubtless  one  would  go 
farther  to  see  Melrose  by  moonlight  than 
to   see  a  teakettle  simmering  on  a  hob; 
but   after  all,   to  the   diligent  reader  of 
his  Scott  and  his  Dickens,  there  are  many 
like  elements  of  pleasure  in  the  two  sights; 
and  I  will  not  too  hastily  decide  whether 
I  have  more  daily  pleasure  from  the  vast 
white  pyramid  of  Mont  Blanc,  that  looks 


206  THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 

me  in  the  face  through  my  parlor  windows,* 
and  "  clear,  placid  Lenian,"  down  the  slope 
beneath  me,  and  the  gray  mass  of  towers 
of  the  old  cathedral  to  my  right,  than  comes 
to  me  from  the  magpies  that  chase  each 
other  chattering  across  the  lawn,  and  the 
primroses  and  tiny  daisies  that  blossom 
along  our  path  under  favor  of  this  mild 
February,  and  the  tufts  of  legendary  mis- 
tletoe that  hang  in  the  bare  poplar  tree, 
and  the  hedge-rows,  from  which  the  gar- 
dener is  now  busy  in  gathering  store  of 
good  material  for  next  winter's  fagots. 

Which  brings  me  back  again  to  fagots, 
where  we  started.  The  fagot  is  not,  as  I 
used  vaguely  to  imagine,  a  mere  indefinite 
bundle  of  fire- wood.  There  is  logic  in  its 
constitution,  as  there  has  sometimes  been, 
in  the  severest  sense,  logic  in  its  applica- 
tion. First,  there  shall  be  a  handful  or  two 
of  small  twigs,  such  as  the  trimmings  of 
the  hedges  furnish  in  generous  abundance; 
then  a  handful  of  bigger  brush;  and  finally, 
two,  or  at  most  three,  stoutish  sticks,  to 
give  solidity  and  respectability  to  the 
whole.  These  elements  being  brought  to- 
gether, then  does  the  hedger  cunningly  lay 
about  them  a  green  and  supple  withe,  and 

*  In  revising  this  paper  for  its  present  use,  the  writer 
has  not  thought  needful  to  wash  out  the  "local  color" 
that  came  into  it  by  its  being  written  at  Geneva. 


THE   USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.  207 

by  some  dexterous  twist  or  double-hitch 
firmly  bind  them  into  one.  "With  a  few 
months'  seasoning,  the  true  and  normal 
fagot  becomes  the  ideally  perfect  com- 
mencement of  a  wood  fire.  A  wisp  of 
lighted  paper,  sometimes  a  mere  match,  is 
enough  to  start  a  combustion  which  ma- 
tures, when  properly  sustained,  into  a  solid 
mass  of  brands  and  coals.  I  often  raise 
the  question  whether  the  enormous  waste 
of  small  wood  in  all  our  forests,  even  those 
within  easy  reach  of  a  market,  might  not 
be  saved,  and  a  fine  opportunity  of  delight- 
ful employment  given  to  workless  city 
street-boys,  if  some  one  would  only  organ- 
ize a  phalanx  of  fagoteers  for  an  expedi- 
tion against  the  underbrush  which  is  so 
often  accounted  a  nuisance,  but  might  so 
easily  be  converted  into  a  blessing  both  to 
him  that  gives  and  him  that  takes. 

It  would  astonish  you  to  see  in  this  wood- 
less country,  where  coal  is  of  easy  access, 
how  general  is  the  dependence  both  for 
warmth  and  for  cooking  on  wood  fires; 
when,  in  New  England,  even  farmers  in 
little  inland  towns  begin  to  feel  that  they 
cannot  afford  to  burn  wood  on  a  hearth. 
If  you  were  to  ask  me  whence  come  the  sup- 
plies on  which  the  people  here  rely,  I 
should  refer  you  partly  to  the  mountains, 


208     THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 

but  rather  to  sundry  lines  of  lopped  and 
stumpy  posts  that  intersect  the  landscape, 
bearing  all  over  their  wrinkled  bark  the 
scars  of  ancient  wounds,  and  about  their 
knobby  heads,  sometimes,  chaplets  of  gay 
young  sprouts,  strangely  in  contrast  with 
their  aspect  of  venerable  and  bereaved  old 
age.  The  Swiss  woodman  rarely  ventures 
manfully  to  attack  a  tree  at  its  trunk.  He 
trims,  he  lops,  he  maims,  he  mutilates,  and 
then  he  leaves  the  poor  branchless,  leafless 
stock  to  bring  forth  a  new  progeny  for  a 
renewed  slaughter.  Standing  before  one 
of  these  venerable  boles,  gnarled  and  hol- 
lowed out  with  age,  yet  making  one  more 
brave  effort  to  put  forth  a  growth  of  young 
branches,  one  is  irresistibly  reminded  of 
some  white-haired  old  "mammy"  cherish- 
ing her  last  pickaninny  of  a  grandchild, 
and  telling  the  rueful  story  of  two  genera- 
tions gone  one  by  one  to  the  auction-block. 
There  is  vast  economy  in  this  method,  I 
am  told.  Managed  with  care,  the  mere 
shrubbery  and  ornamental  trees  on  a  gentle- 
man's place  can  be  made  to  yield  his  sup- 
ply of  fire-wood  and  hardly  show  any  mark 
save  that  of  judicious  pruning.  But  oh! 
the  ruthless  cruelty  of  it  as  generally  con- 
ducted! Hardly  a  tree  in  the  canton  of 
Geneva  is  suffered  to  grow  in  its  natural 


THE  USE  OF   FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.  209 


shape;  and  the  wide  waste  of  reckless  ruin 
around  a  charcoal  pit  on  a  Litchfield  County 
hill-side  is  less  sad  than  the  double  aisle  of 
naked  trunks  of  beech  and  oak  that  stand 
despairing  in  the  hedge-rows  between 
which  I  take  my  daily  walk  to  town. 

My  fagot,  as  I  find  it  waiting  for  me  in 
the  morning  on  my  study  hearth,  sets  me 
thinking  on  many  things.  I  think  of  Ro- 
man lictors  and  their  fasces;  of  "  the  good 
La  Fontaine  "  and  his  fable  teaching  that 
union  is  strength;  and  as  I  strike  a  match, 
and  the  flame  crackles  through  the  twigs, 
and  there  is  a  smell  as  of  a  forest  fire,  and 
in  a  moment  a  fierce  blaze  shoots  up  the 
chimney,  I  think  of  Fox's  "  Book  of  Mar- 
tyrs," and  of  Latimer,  and  Ridley,  and 
others  of  whom  the  world  was  not  worthy. 
For  the  fagot  has  been  hallowed,  like  the 
cross,  as  the  implement  of  death  for  re- 
ligion's sake. 

But  most  I  am  reminded  of  that  October 
day,  nearly  three  hundred  and  fifty  years 
ago,  when  one  of  the  first  physicians  of  that 
time,  and  one  of  the  greatest  scholars  of  an 
age  of  great  scholars,  was  brought  out  from 
the  prison  in  which  he  had  been  shivering 
with  cold  and  devoured  by  vermin,  and  led 
into  the  presence  of  the  magistrates  of 
Geneva  to  listen  to  this  sentence: 


210  THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 

"Having  God  and  His  Holy  Scriptures 
before  our  eyes,  and  speaking  in  the  name 
of  the  Father,  and  of  the  Son,  and  of  the 
Holy  Ghost,  we  do  by  this  our  final  sen- 
tence, which  we  give  herewith  in  writing, 
condemn  thee,  Michael  Servetus,  to  be 
bound  and  led  to  the  place  called  Champel, 
and  there  to  be  attached  to  a  stake,  and 
burned  alive  with  thy  book  both  in  man- 
uscript and  in  print,  until  thy  body  be  re- 
duced to  ashes;  and  so  shalt  thou  end  thy 
days  to  give  example  to  others  who  might 
commit  the  same  crime." 

The  records  do  not  inform  us  whether 
the  school-boys  at  Geneva  had  a  half-holi- 
day the  next  morning,  when  the  procession 
started  from  the  prison  at  the  top  of  the 
city  hill  for  the  place  of  execution  at 
Champel.  The  principal  figure  in  the  pro- 
cession, Servetus,  though  suffering  from 
disease,  and  haggard,  no  doubt,  from  his 
imprisonment  and  from  mental  anguish, 
was  a  man  in  the  strength  of  his  age — he 
was  forty-four  years  old,  having  been  born 
in  the  same  year  with  John  Calvin.  By  his 
side  walked  Farel,  the  friend  of  Calvin,  ex- 
horting him  to  confess  and  renouncehishere- 
sies  ;  but  he  only  declared  that  he  suffered 
unjustly,  and  prayed  God  to  have  mercy 
on  his  accusers.  "  Whereupon,"  says  Farel, 
•CI  said  to  him  immediately:  'What,  what! 
when   you  have  committed   the  worst  of 


THE  USE  OF   FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.  211 


sins,  you  justify  yourself  !  If  you  go  on 
so,  I  will  leave  you  to  God's  judgments  ;  I 
won't  go  with  you  another  step  !  I  had 
meant  to  stand  by  you  till  your  last  breath.' 
After  that,  he  did  not  say  anything  more 
of  the  sort.  He  prayed:  O  God,  save  my 
soul  !  O  Jesus,  Son  of  God  eternal,  have 
mercy  on  me!'  But,"  says  Farel,  " we 
could  not  make  him  confess  Christ  as  eter- 
nal Son  of  God." 

They  came,  at  last,  to  the  place  called 
Champel.  Few  visitors  at  Geneva  see  the 
spot.  The  people  are  not  proud  to  show  it. 
It  is  on  a  hill- side  to  the  south  of  the  town, 
commanding  a  fair  view  of  the  broad  val- 
ley of  the  Rhone,  and  of  the  ancient  city. 
The  precise  place  is  now  covered  by  a 
house  ;  but  I  have  met  old  people  who 
remembered  when  it  was  known  as  the 
Champ  du  Bourreau — Hangman's  Lot — 
and  who  say  that  when  they  were  boys 
there  was  a  little  pit  in  the  midst  of  it 
that  they  used  to  point  out  to  one  another 
as  the  place  where  the  stake  was  planted. 
Here  the  pitiful  procession  halted.  With 
much  persuasion  the  victim  was  induced 
to  commend  himself  to  the  prayers  of  the 
people.  And  when  he  had  kneeled  down 
and  prayed,  he  stepped  upon  the  fagots 
that  were  heaped  about  the  stake,  and  was 


212     THE  USE  OP  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 

bound  to  it  by  a  chain  about  the  waist  ; 
his  book  was  hung  at  his  side ;  a  wreath 
of  leaves  dusted  over  with  brimstone  was 
placed  on  his  head;  there  was  one  loud  cry- 
as  the  executioner  brought  up  the  lighted 
torch ;  but  that  was  the  end  of  it.  Some 
say  the  fagots  were  green  ;  but  then  old 
Mr.  Gaberel's  History  may  be  right,  that 
this  was  out  of  humanity,  so  that  the  suffo- 
cating smoke  might  put  the  sufferer  more 
quickly  out  of  misery. 

"That  was  the  end  of  it,"  we  said.  It 
seemed  to  be  the  end  of  it.  But  somehow 
this  case  of  Servetus,  in  one  shape  or  an- 
other, keeps  coming  into  court  over  and 
over  again  from  generation  to  generation. 
Generally,  not  to  say  always,  it  comes  in 
the  shape  of  a  discussion  of  what  sort 
of  part  it  was  that  John  Calvin  had  in 
the  affair  ;  and  in  this  discussion  a  very 
needless  amount  of  acrimony  has  been 
shown  by  some,  who  have  seemed  to  think 
that  the  character  of  Calvin's  theology, 
or  of  that  great  and  splendid  order  of 
Christian  churches  of  which  he  was  the 
father,  was  somehow  involved  in  the 
result.  Let  those  on  either  side  who  have 
been  discomposed  by  such  a  thought  bear 
in  mind  that  the  discredit  of  whatever 
wrong  Calvin  may  have  done  in  this  mat- 


THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.    213 


ter  can  fall  only  on  those  who  accept  and 
justify  his  course. 

To  defend  Calvin  for  his  course  towards 
Servetus  is  no  longer  possible,  in  the  light 
of  the  full  array  of  evidence  now  acces- 
sible to  every  scholar.  Something  can  be 
pleaded  in  mitigation.  He  was  not,  as  is 
sometimes  asserted,  guilty  of  unfaithful- 
ness to  any  principles  of  toleration  of  his 
own.  Farel  expressed  his  master's  thought 
as  well  as  his  own,  in  one  of  the  letters  to 
Calvin  in  which  he  clamored  for  the  death 
of  the  heretic.  "  Because  the  Pope  con- 
demns believers  for  the  crime  of  heresy, 
because  passionate  judges  inflict  on  the 
innocent  the  punishments  which  heretics 
deserve,  it  is  absurd  to  conclude  from  this 
that  the  latter  ought  not  to  be  put  to 
death  as  a  protection  to  the  faithful.  For 
my  part,  I  have  often  declared  myself 
ready  to  die,  if  I  had  taught  anything  con- 
trary to  sound  doctrine,  and  that  I  should 
be  worthy  of  the  most  dreadful  punish- 
ment if  I  were  to  turn  any  from  the  true 
faith  of  Christ ;  and  I  cannot  apply  any 
different  rule  to  other  men."  This  point 
being  established,  the  fatal  conclusion  fol- 
lowed ;  for  it  is  impossible  to  dispute  that 
Servetus  was  a  heretic  of  an  aggravated 
and  dangerous  type.     He  was  no  mere  un- 


214  THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 

believer,  but  a  theologian  intense  in  his 
convictions,  with  a  plan  for  reconstructing 
theology,  the  church,  and  society,  as  set 
forth  in  his  book  of  the  "Restitutio 
Christianismi,"  or  "  Christianity  Restored." 
And  since  he  was  a  theologian  of  that  pe- 
riod, it  is  needless  to  add  that  his  manner 
of  expressing  his  views  was  acrimonious 
and  insulting  to  all  antagonists,  both  Cath- 
olic and  Protestant.  Taking  his  career 
altogether,  he  does  not  appear  to  advan- 
tage in  the  figure  of  a  martyr  of  free 
thought  and  fidelity  to  conviction,  under 
which  some  would  fain  present  him  to  us. 
But  admitting  that  according  to  the 
principles  universally  accepted  in  that  age 
the  execution  of  Servetus  was  justifiable, 
we  are  still  far  from  any  adequate  vindica- 
tion of  the  course  pursued  by  Calvin  in  the 
affair.  One  of  the  latest  contributions  to 
the  debate,  and  one  of  the  fairest  and 
most  thorough,  is  to  be  found  in  Mr. 
Amedee  Roget's  Histoire  du  Peaple  de 
Geneve.  Geneva  is  a  very  hive  of  busy 
antiquaries,  among  whom  Mr.  Roget  is 
distinguished  for  his  patient  exactness. 
As  a  man  of  orthodox  sympathies,  he  can- 
not be  impeached  of  prejudice  against 
Calvin.  I  think  that  his  judgment  in 
the  case,  delivered  in  view  of  important 
evidence  that   was  not  known  to  all  his 


THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.     215 

predecessors,  is  not  likely  to  be  reversed. 

Says  Mr.  Roget : 

"The  punishment  of  Servetus,  consid- 
ered in  itself,  leaves  no  very  dark  stigma 
on  the  reformer's  character.  But  on  moral 
principles  that  are  the  same  in  every  age, 
Calvin  stands  condemned  for  having  de- 
nounced Servetus  to  the  Catholic  Inquisi- 
tion by  the  use  of  confidential  papers,  and 
for  having  delivered  the  unfortunate  fu- 
gitive to  the  Geneva  magistrates,  when  he 
was  on  his  way  to  try  his  fortune  in  Italy. 
Granted  that  Calvin  was  in  the  line  of  his 
duty  when  he  kept  guard,  in  his  way 
(which  was  the  way  of  his  age),  for  the 
security  of  the  reformed  churches.  Had 
he  any  charge  over  the  police  of  consciences 
in  Catholic  countries  ?  Neither  can  we 
accept  as  natural,  or  compatible  with  a 
Christian  spirit,  the  hard  heart  with  which 
the  reformer  expresses  himself  to  the  end 
with  regard  to  his  rival,  without  so  much 
as  a  moment's  softening  at  the  sight  of  the 
scaffold."  * 

*  A  still  later  volume  contributed  to  the  literature  of 
this  controversy  is  entitled  "Servetus  and  Calvin;  a 
Study  of  an  Important  Epoch  in  the  Early  History  of  the 
Reformation."  By  R.  Willis,  M.D.,  London.  It  is  an  inter- 
esting book;  ambitious  in  style,  and  diligently  prepared  ; 
but  adds  little  to  the  work  of  previous  authors,  especially 
of  Tollin,  French  pastor  at  Magdeburg,  who  has  made 
Servetus  his  life-study.  With  the  recent  work  of  Mr. 
Roget,  and  with  Piinjer's  De  Michaelis  Serveti  Doctrina 
Commentatio,  Dr.  Willis  does  not  seem  to  have  been  ac- 
quainted. His  volume  is  affected  both  by  the  furor  bio- 
graphicus  and  by  the  odium  theologicum.  It  is  not  easy  to 
make  a  first-class  martyr  to  the  truth,  of  a  man  who 
iied  so  easily  under  oath  as  Servetus,  and  who  professed 
before  the  Inquisition  his  prompt  readiness  to  renounce 
all  his  cherished  convictions;  and  a  cool  judgment  will 
decline  to  follow  Dr.  Willis  in  elevating  him  above  Calvin 
and  Luther  as  a  theologian.    Dr.  Willis  will  be  surprised  to 


216  THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 

Let  us  make  every  concession  that  the 
case  admits.  Doubtless  Calvin  was  serious- 
ly anxious  to  prevent  the  propagation  of 
destructive  error.  Probably  the  case  of 
Servetus  was  complicated  with  political 
plots  for  the  overthrow  of  Calvin  and  his 
work.  Certainly  the  reformer  made  some 
motion  to  procure  the  commutation  of  the 
penalty  to  a  less  dreadful  form  of  death. 
We  will  try  to  believe,  even,  what  he  tried 
to  make  himself  believe,  that  there  was  no 
spark  of  human  vindictiveness  in  all  his 
efforts  to  compass  the  death  of  the  man 
with  whom  he  had  for  years  been  exchang- 
ing every  sort  of  acrimonious  insult.  This 
is  about  all  that  can  be  said.     But  against 

be  accused  of  a  theological  spirit,  having,  doubtless,  the 
prevailing  impression  that  it  is  only  Christian  writers 
that  are  liable  to  this  affection,  arid  that  disbelievers 
are  necessarily  safe  from  it.  But  his  scornful  ignorance 
of  theological  history  and  nomenclature  betrays  him 
into  some  strange  blunders.  The  most  remarkable  of 
these  is  that  of  claiming  for  his  hero  the  original  inven- 
tion of  the  "  double  sense  of  prophecy,"  which  ap- 
plies the  words  of  the  prophet  primarily  to  a  near  event, 
and  secondarily  to  a  remoter  one ;  and  he  illustrates 
this  at  much  length  from  Servetus1  edition  of  Pagnini's 
Bible,  by  instances  which,  he  is  sure,  must  have  roused 
the  ortliodox  rage  of  Calvin.  If  he  had  taken  the  pains 
to  turn  to  Calvin's  Commentaries,  he  would  have  found 
these  identical  expositions  given  to  many  of  the  same 
texts  1  As  to  the  principle  which  strikes  him  as  so  bold 
a  novelty  in  Servetus,  he  will  find  it  as  far  back  as  Theo- 
dore of  Mopsuestia,  not  to  say  as  far  back  as  the  Apos- 
tolic Fathers.  Theology  may  be  a  very  unworthy  study, 
out  after  all  it  is  well  to  know  something  about  it  before 
undertaking  to  write  on  theological  subjects.  Dr.  Willis's 
slip-up  on  such  a  matter  as  this  tends  to  discredit  that 
splendid  air  of  omniscience  with  which  he  sweeps  away 
all  remaining  doubt  as  (for  instance)  to  the  date  of  the 
prophets,  and  the  authorship  of  the  fourth  gospel. 


THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.  217 

this  we  have  before  our  eyes  those  fatal 
letters  of  Calvin's  confidential  friend,  De 
Trie,  which  show  the  reformer  in  the  act  of 
furnishing  the  proofs  to  convict  his  antag- 
onist before  the  cruel  tribunal  at  Vienne, 
in  France,  and  the  sentence  of  that  court 
predicated  upon  seventeen  letters  furnished 
by  John  Calvin,  preacher  at  Geneva.  We 
have  that  letter  to  Farel,  of  seven  years 
before,  in  which,  speaking  of  Servetus's 
offer  to  come  on  to  Geneva,  if  Calvin 
wished,  to  discuss  certain  subjects  with 
him,  he  says:  "I  shall  make  him  no 
promises,  for  if  he  comes,  and  if  I  have  any 
influence  in  the  city,  I  shall  see  to  it  that 
he  does  not  get  out  of  it  alive."  We  have 
Calvin's  own  avowal  that  the  arrest  of  the 
furtive  sojourner  and  the  relentless  prose- 
cution that  followed  were  of  his  instigation. 
We  have  the  official  record  and  Calvin's 
own  version  of  the  bitter,  bitter  wranglings 
between  himself  and  the  prisoner  in  the 
presence  of  the  judges,  and  of  his  last  in- 
terview with  the  condemned,  on  the  eve  of 
execution,  in  which  he  shows  himself  to 
the  last  the  same  fierce  dogmatizer.  And 
finally,  we  have  his  writing  in  self -vindi- 
cation, when  the  dreadful  scene  was  over, 
in  which  he  taunts  his  dead  adversary  with 
not  having  formally  restated,  in  the  article 


218     THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 


of  death,  the  doctrines  for  which  he  hero- 
ically perished,  and  seizes  on  his  dying 
prayers  as  a  proof  that  he  had  no  sincerity 
in  his  opinions.  It  is  in  this  same  paper 
that  he  recites  the  appearance  of  Servetus, 
when  his  punishment  was  announced  to 
him:  "When  the  news  was  brought  to 
him,  he  seemed  at  intervals  like  one 
stunned.  Then  he  sighed  so  that  the  whole 
room  resounded.  Anon,  he  began  to  howl 
like  a  mad  man.  In  short,  he  had  no  more 
composure  than  one  possessed.  Towards  the 
end  he  got  to  crying  so  that  he  beat  his 
breast  incessantly,  bellowing,  in  his  Spanish 
fashion,  '  Misericordia  !  misericordia  ! '  " 
Through  all  these  dismal  documents,  not 
one  syllable  of  tenderness  or  human  pity, 
unless  it  is  in  that  letter  to  Farel,  of  the 
20th  of  August,  in  which  he  says:  "I 
hope  he  will  be  sentenced  to  death,  but  I 
wish  that  they  may  mitigate  the  horror  of 
his  punishment." 

The  prevailing  motive  that  impelled  the 
burning  of  Servetus  was  not  less  honorable 
than  that  which  stirred  in  the  bosoms  of 
Caiaphas  and  the  Sanhedrim  on  an  occasion 
not  in  all  respects  unlike:  "It  is  expedient 
that  one  man  die  for  the  people."  Here 
was  a  golden  opportunity  for  vindicating 
the  reformed  churches  from  that  reproach 


THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.  219 


of  latitudinarianism  that  was  thrown  upon 
them  by  the  Catholics.     Thus  wrote  the 
pastors  of  Zurich  when  officially  consulted 
on  the  matter  by  the  Geneva  magistrates: 
"We  think  it  needful  to  show  great  rigor 
against    him,    and   all    the    more   as  our 
churches  are  decried,  in  distant  parts,  as 
heretical,  or  as  lending  protection  to  here- 
tics.    Divine    Providence    now   offers   an 
opportunity  to  purge  yourselves,  and  us  at 
the  same  time,  of  an  unjust  accusation." 
It  is  a  curious  fact,  repeatedly  illustrated 
in  ecclesiastical   history,   that  persecuted 
heretics  commonly  seek  to  vindicate  them- 
selves from  the  charge  of  heresy  by  perse- 
cuting other  heretics  still  more  heretical. 
In  the  present  case  the  fact  has  a  double 
illustration  ;  for  among  those   who   have 
given  their  strong  approbation  to  the  exe- 
cution of  Servetus  is  the  most  unexpected 
name  of  Dr.  Jerome  Bolsec,  who  had  been 
hunted  out  of  Geneva  in  peril  of  his  life  by 
the  same  John  Calvin,  for  his  unsoundness 
on  predestination.     He  attempts  to  settle 
this  account  with  his  adversary  by  a  "Life 
of  Calvin  "  which  is  the  reverse  of  a  pane- 
gyric.    But  he  protests  therein :  "  I  do  not 
write  these  things  out  of  any  displeasure 
at   the   death   of  such   a   monstrous   and 
stinking  heretic  as  Servetus;  I  wish  that 


220     THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA. 


all   his   like   were   exterminated   and  the 
church  of  our  Lord  well  purged  of  such 


vermin." 


This  name  of  Bolsec  brings  to  mind  the 
story  of  his  trial,  the  documents  of  which 
have  lately  been  printed  in  full  by  another 
Geneva  antiquary,  Mr.  Henry  Fazy,  and 
prove  that  the  austere  severity  of  Calvin 
in  the  case  of  Servetus  was  no  solitary 
lapse  under  unwonted  temptation,  for  his 
pursuit  of  Bolsec,  if  less  fatal  in  its  result, 
was  not  less  truculent. 

A  century  and  a  half  ago,  that  malicious 
wit,  Voltaire,  who  never  knew  how  to  do  a 
generous  thing  without  mixing  it  with  a 
malignant  stab  at  somebody,  paraded  the 
Servetus  story  in  its  worst  light,  by  way  of 
exhibiting  Protestants  as  equally  intolerant 
with  Catholics.  One  of  the  most  eminent 
of  the  Geneva  pastors,  Vernet,  set  himself 
to  the  task  of  refutation,  and  made  appli- 
cation to  the  city  council  for  access  to  the 
official  documents,  which  at  that  time  were 
under  lock  and  key.  He  was  surprised  at 
the  delays  and  discouragements  which  he 
encountered.  The  syndic  Calandrini  ad- 
vised him  that  silence  seemed  wiser  than 
anything  that  could  be  said.  Vernet 
begged  that  at  least  three  questions  which 
he  wished  to  put  might  be  answered  from 


THE  USE  OF  FAGOTS  AT  GENEVA.  221 


the    documents,  and   pressed   his    petition 
with   some    importunity.     He  received   at 
last  a  letter   from  the  syndic,  of  which  he 
could  not  complain   as  wanting  in  explicit- 
ness.     It  ran  on   this   wise:  "The  council 
considers  it   important    that  the   criminal 
procedure    against  Servetus   should  not  be 
made  public,  and    does  not   wish   it  to  be 
communicated   to     any    person   whatever, 
either  in  whole  or  in  part.     The  conduct  of 
Calvin  and  of  the  council  was  such  that  we 
wish  it  to  be  buried  in  profound  oblivion. 
There  is  no  defence  for  Calvin.     Plead  the 
state  of  your  health  in  excuse  for  dropping 
a  work  which  will    either  be  damaging  to 
religion,  to  the   Reformation,  and  to  the 
good  fame   of  Geneva,  or  will  be  very  un- 
faithful to  the  truth." 

More  than  a  century  has  gone  by,  and 
the  archives  of  Geneva,  and  many  a  sor- 
rowful document  besides,  are  now  accessible 
to  every  comer.  But  the  advice  of  Syndic 
Calandrini  to  any  one  who  would  attempt 
the  vindication,  on  this  head,  of  the  other- 
wise illustrious  memory  of  Calvin,  is  as 
good  advice  to-day  as  it  was  then. 


THE  AMERICAN  CHURCH   AND   THE 
PRIMITIVE  CHURCH 


THE  AMERICAN  CHURCH, 

AND  THE 

PRIMITIVE  CHURCH. 


The  two  commonest  conceptions  of  the 
church  among  American  Christians  may  be 
characterized  as  the  Congregationalist  view, 
and  the  Sectarian  view—  both  of  them  radi- 
cally unscriptural  and  false. 

1.  The  Congregationalist  view  holds  that 
a  church  is  a  company  of  believers  gathered 
out  of  the  Christian  community  by  volun- 
tary association,  and  organized  for  worship 
and  for  other  Christian  duty.  This  view 
finds  in  every  community  of  Christians  as 
many  churches  as  there  are  organized  asso- 
ciations of  this  kind,  and  holds  that  every 
such  congregation  is  an  independent  unit 
of  sovereignty,  owing  duties  of  comity, 
courtesy,  and  fellowship  to  the  rest,  doubt- 
less, but  each  in  itself  a  complete  church. 
Seeking  its  warrant  in  the  Scriptures,  it 
plants  itself  with  immense  strength  on  the 
undeniable,  constant  usage  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament, which  never  speaks  of  ' '  the  church" 


226  AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH. 


of  a  province,  no  matter  how  small  the 
province  may  be,  but  always  of  "  the 
churches."  Little  Achaia  had  no  institu- 
tion called  "  the  church  of  Achaia"  ;  but  it 
had  churches  ;  and  so  with  Galatia.  The 
little  patch  of  Asia  Minor,  which  is  the 
New  Testament  Asia,  had  certainly  more 
than  seven  churches,  but  no  "  church  of 
Asia."  Corinth  had  its  own  church  ;  and 
the  harbor  town  of  Corinth,  Cenchreae, 
nine  miles  distant,  had  its  own  church,  too. 
The  point  seems  inexpugnably  taken  against 
those  who  would  hold  that  the  church  is  a 
provincial  organization  stretching  over  a 
considerable  region   and   embracing   many 

towns. 

But  while  holding  this  point  so  clearly, 
the  adherents  of  this  theory  have  resolutely 
blinked  another  point  which  is  just  as  clear 
and  constant,  to  wit  :  that  the  Scriptures, 
which  never  speak  of  the  church  of  any 
province,  equally  refrain  from  speaking  of 
the  churches  of  a  town.  The  Christians  of 
a  town  multiply  by  thousands  ;  they  are 
disturbed  by  mutual  alienations  and  serious 
variations  in  opinion,  and  strong  personal 
attachments  to  different  leaders  ;  but  they 
are  always  one  church  in  that  town  ;  and  if 
a  division  seems  to  impend,  the  apostle  dep- 
recates it  with  horror,  saying,  "  I  beseech 


AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH.    227 


you  by  the  mercies  of  God,  don't  divide." 
All  which  is  very  unlike  Congregationalism. 
2.  But  it  is  still  more  unlike  the  alterna- 
tive theory  of  Sectarianism;  which  holds 
not  only  that  the  Christian  population  of 
any  town  may  properly  be  split  up  into  dif- 
ferent parties   without   common  organiza- 
tion, but  also  that  each  one  of  these  par- 
ties, entering  into  confederation  with  a  like 
party  in  other  communities,  becomes  thus 
a  constituent  part  of  a  church— not  of  the 
town  church  where  it  exists,  but  of  a  sect 
of  Christians  extended  over  a  nation  or  a 
continent.      For    this    national    party    of 
Christians  it  calls  by  the  name  Church; 
though  it  is  as  far  removed  from  anything 
known  by  that  name  in  the  New  Testament 
as  can  well  be  imagined.     In  the  dialect  of 
the  New  Testament  there  are  names  dis- 
tinctly applied  to  the  sort  of  organization 
which  we  commonly  call  by  the  name  of 
church.     It  is  spoken  of  there  as  a  axi^jJia 
or  a  ai'peffis.     We  shall  inevitably  go  astray 
in  all  our  reasonings  on  this  subject  unless 
we  bear  in  mind  that  this  prevalent  Ameri- 
can use  of  the  word  church  is  one  unknown 
to  the  Scriptures. 

And  it  is  well  to  remark,  in  passing,  that 
this  misnomer  is  not  in  the  least  justified  by 
the  fact  that  some  one  or  other  of  these 


228  AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH. 

schisms  or  heresies  is  disposed  to  insist 
with  somewhat  obtrusive  emphasis  on  the 
undeniable  fact  that  the  others  are  not 
churches.  Of  course  they  are  not  churches 
— any  of  them.  A  party  of  Christians  is 
not  the  church,  any  more  than  a  party  of 
citizens  is  the  state — any  more  than  the 
part  of  anything  is  the  whole  of  it. 

3.  And  let  me,  in  one  more  word,  note  a 
caution  against  one  other  misconception  of 
the  church,  which  I  suspect  to  be  prevalent 
— that  the  church  of  Christ  is  the  sum  of 
existing  so-called  churches,  schisms,  or  (ac- 
cording to  a  favorite  American  euphemism) 
' '  denominations. ' '  According  to  the  New 
Testament  conception,  the  church  is  made 
up  of  the  Christian  people,  not  of  Christian 
parties.  It  is  "  the  communion  of  saints" 
— not  a  congregation  of  a  selection  of  the 
saints.  It  is  lt  the  communion  of  saints," 
not  the  confederation  of  sects.  The  king- 
dom of  Christ  is  the  commonwealth  of  all 
humble  and  holy  souls.  His  reign  is  within 
them. 

Setting  aside,  thus,  three  untenable  con- 
ceptions :  (1)  that  a  church  is  a  club  of 
Christians  formed  on  some  principle  of  selec- 
tion out  of  a  Christian  community  ;  (2)  that 
a  church  is  a  sect  of  Christians  constituted 
over  a  large  region  by  the  federation  of 


AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH.  229 


such  local  clubs  ;  (3)  that  the  church  is  the 
totality  of  sects  ;— setting  these  aside,  I  pro- 
pose this  as  the  true  conception,  that  the 
church  of  any  place  is  the  whole  common- 
wealth of  the  Christian  people  of  that  place. 
There  have  been  many  "  notes  of  the 
church"  proposed  by  Christians  of  various 
parties, — form  of  government,  pedigree  of 
ordination,  purity  of  doctrine,  universality 
of  extent, — always  with  a  view  to  this  : 
that  the  application  of  them  shall  prove 
each  man's  party  to  be  the  only  church,  and 
shall  leave  the  other  parties  outside  of  it. 
But  it  is  not  difficult  in  reading  the  Acts 
and  letters  of  the  Apostles  to  recognize  this 
as  the  one  trait  of  the  church  as  they  un- 
derstood it,  that  it  was  the  fellowship  of  all 
the  Christians. 

Now  while  I  acknowledge  most  painful 
defects  in  the  organization  of  our  modern, 
and  especially  our  American  Christianity, 
and  while  I  look  with  earnest  hope,  not 
unmixed  with  anxiety,  at  the  many  move- 
ments toward  a  better  state  of  things, 
I  confess  a  lack  of  complete  and  un- 
reserved sympathy  with  the  lamentations 
that  are  often  heard  over  the  lost  unity  of 
the  church,  and  with  longings  after  a  res- 
toration of  unity.  For  I  cannot  bring  my- 
self to  account  of  the  unity  of  Christ's 


230  AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH. 


church  as  of  a  thing  that  used  to  be,  or  a 
thing  that  ought  to  be  attained  in  the  fu- 
ture ;  but  as  a  thing  that  is— is  now,  as  it 
was  in  the  beginning  and  ever  shall  be. 
The  religious  affections  of  my  heart  fail  to 
lay  hold  with  any  satisfaction  on  some  frag- 
ment of  a  church  which  used  to  be  one,  and 
hopes  to  be  one  again.  But  I  recognize 
and  love,  through  all  the  ages  and  in  every 
land,  One  Holy  Catholic  and  Apostolic 
Church,  the  fellowship  of  all  saints. 

And  that  which  I  acknowledge  and  love 
as  I  look  abroad  over  the  great  scope  of  the 
world  and  of  history,  I  do  not  fail  to  find 
when  I  look  about  me  in  whatever  place  I 
find  my  work  appointed— the  one  church, 
the  commonwealth   of  believers.     To  the 
service  of  this,  and  not  of  any  fraction  of 
it,  however  pure  in  doctrine,  however  scrip- 
tural or  historical  in  ritual,  however  correct 
in  form  of  organization,  however  imposing 
by  the  magnificence  of  its  extension— to 
the  service  of  the  whole  fellowship  of  be- 
lievers in  the  town  in  which  I  serve,  I  am 
devoted  by  the  consecration  that  makes  me 
the  minister  of  Christ. 

I  am  quite  ready  for  that  impatient  in- 
terruption complaining  that  all  this  is  quite 
out  of  time  and  place— that  whatever  may 
once  have  been  true,  and  whatever  may 


AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH.   2B1 

even  now  be  true  in  some  communities,  in 
the  American  city  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury the  church  is  no  longer  one,  but  is 
divided.  Divided?  Yes,  indeed.  That 
which  the  Apostle  Paul  deprecated  with 
earnest  entreaty,  adjuring  the  Christians  of 
Corinth  by  the  mercies  of  God  that  it  should 
not  be,  has  befallen  us,  that  "  there  are 
divisions  among  us. ' '  Doubtless  the  Church 
of  Christ  in  the  American  town  is  divided  ; 
but  it  is  a  divided  unit — it  is  not  many 
units.  It  is  a  divided  church — it  is  not 
many  churches,  even  though  in  our  debased 
modern  dialect  we  may  combine  to  call  it 
so.  The  one  Church  of  Christ  in  the 
American  town  does  not  need  to  be  cre- 
ated. It  needs  only  to  be  recognized,  and 
to  be  manifested  to  the  world. 

It  needs  to  be  recognized  by  its  own  mem- 
bers and  ministers.  It  does  not  now  offer 
itself  to  observation  in  any  corporate  form. 
It  has  no  chief  officer,  the  visible  center  of 
unity  ;  no  organized  council  or  presbytery 
consulting  for  its  united  interest ;  no  con- 
stitution or  laws  except  the  word  of  its 
Lord  in  the  New  Testament ;  but,  men 
and  brethren,  you  who  believe  in  the  Holy 
Ghost,  do  you  doubt — can  you  doubt,  so 
long  as  they  who  pass  from  death  to  life  are 
known  by  this  that  they  love  the  brethren, 


232  AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH. 

—that  in  your  own  city,  where  you  live 
and  labor,  the  Church  of  Christ,  one  and 
indivisible,  is  a  most  solid  reality  ? — the 
Church,  with  its  cementing  power  of  mu- 
tual love,  so  sadly  hindered  by  ignorances 
and  misconceptions,  and  by  the  miserable 
divisive  spirit  of  sectarian  allegiance  ;  with 
its  common  zeal  for  its  one  Lord  now 
wretchedly  squandered  in  wasteful  competi- 
tions ;  with  its  craving  needs  and  duties, 
so  often  forgotten  by  its  ministers  in  their 
exorbitant  sense  of  duty  to  a  narrow  parish 
or  congregation  ?  Must  you  needs  see  this 
one  Church  of  Christ  before  you  can  be- 
lieve? Have  you  no  sense  of  paramount 
loyalty  and  duty  to  the  whole  body  of 
Christ's  disciples,  but  only  a  little  gush  of 
sentiment,  when  you  have  given  the  devo- 
tion of  your  heart  and  the  strength  of  your 
manhood  to  the  supreme  service  of  the 
party  of  Christians  whose  fortunes  you  are 
pushing  with  the  spirit  of  a  baseball  game, 
as  if  the  "  emulations"  which  Paul  con- 
demns as  works  of  the  flesh  were  the  very 
fruits  of  the  Holy  Spirit  ? 

And  just  because  I  have  small  respect  for 
that  love  for  the  one  church  which  expends 
itself  wholly  in  sentimental  words,  I  bring 
the  matter  down  to  a  most  practical  illus- 
tration : 


AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH.  233 


From  year  to  year,  as  the  midsummer  re- 
turns, is  renewed  the  annual  reproach  of 
the  American  Church.     In  city  after  city, 
town  after  town,  as  the  season  of  discom- 
fort, danger,  and  sickness  comes  on,  the 
Christian  ministers,  with  the  honorable  ex- 
ception of  one  great  communion,  and  with 
certain  individual  exceptions  beside,  will, 
as   a    body,    simultaneously    forsake    their 
charge,  and  leave  the  city  deserted  of  its 
resident  pastors.     And  each  man  speaking 
for  himself  will  say,  and  say  truly,  that  he 
leaves  with  the  consent  of  his  congregation, 
and  that  so  far  as  his  congregation  is  con- 
cerned this  is  the  best  time  for  him  to  take 
his  needful  rest.     And  no  man  will  con- 
sider that  each  man  is  member  of  a  college 
of  clergy  having  charge  of  the  common  in- 
terests of  the  church  of  the  whole  town. 
If  once  the  individual  minister  should  learn 
to  recognize  in  his  own  heart  that  the  one 
church  of  the  one  Lord  in  his  town  was  a 
most  solemn  reality,  and  that  he  was  not 
merely  the  one  pastor  of  his  little  fold  of 
the  flock,  but  also  one  of  the  company  of 
the  pastors  of  the  whole  flock,  this  annual 
scandal  would  at  once  begin  to  be  abated. 

This  point  simply  by  way  of  illustration 
of  what  might  follow  from  the  mere  recog- 
nition in  each  man's  heart  and  conscience 


234  AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH. 

of  the  doctrine  of  the  Scriptures  concern- 
ing the  unity  of  believers,  and  the  solid 
spiritual  fact  that  they  not  only  ought  to 
be  one,  but  are  one. 

And  when  I  have  said  that  the  unity  of 
the  town  church  ought  to  be  recognized  by 
its  ministers  and  members,  I  need  hardly 
add  that  it  ought  to  be  manifested  to  the 
world.  Being  acknowledged  in  the  indi- 
vidual mind  and  conscience,  it  certainly 
would  be  manifested,  and  that  would  be  ful- 
filled which  was  spoken  by  the  Lord  from 
heaven,  that  the  believers  should  be  one, 
that  the  world  might  know  that  the  Father 
had  sent  the  Son.  Whether  that  would 
come  to  pass  which  certainly  did  come  to 
pass  early  in  the  primeval  history  of  the 
church,  that  the  town  church  should  be 
represented  by  the  town  bishop  at  the  head 
of  the  town  clergy, — this  might  be — or 
might  not  be.  But  somehow  or  other  the 
one  church  would  find  its  voice,  to  which 
the  world  would  love  to  listen. 

Even  now,  he  that  hath  ears  to  hear  may 
hear  what  the  Bride  saith  as  well  as  what 
the  Spirit  saith.  Every  Christian  town 
has  its  speaking  monuments  not  only  of 
the  "competitive  Christianity"  which  di- 
vides us,  but  of  the  common  Christianity 
in  which  we  unite.     Every  office  of  charity 


AMERICAN  CHURCH  AND  PRIMITIVE  CHURCH.  235 


organization  is  a  head -quarters  of  the  one 
church  ;  and  every  individual  charity  from 
which  is  wholly  eliminated  the  leaven  of 
partizanship,  so  that,  undertaken  in  the 
common  love  of  Christ,  and  aiming  at  the 
common  good  of  all  for  whom  Christ  died, 
it  delights  in  putting  glory  on  Christ  him- 
self and  his  whole  church,  is  a  work  of  the 
one  church. 

For  the  manifestation  of  the  one  church 
of  their  town,  how  good  a  work  could  be 
wrought  by  any  two  or  three  Christian 
men,  who  in  a  spirit  wholly  purified  from 
partizanship  should  simply  publish  from 
year  to  year,  with  growing  completeness, 
the  Year-Book  of  the  Church  of  Christ  in 
that  place,  which  should  exhibit  in  love 
and  holy  pride  and  exultation  the  roster  of 
its  clergy  and  its  meetings,  and  the  works 
which  each  year  are  wrought  there,  through 
the  divided  congregations  and  the  sharply 
competing  sects,  in  the  name  of  God's 
holy  Child,  Jesus  !  Such  a  record,  with- 
out one  word  of  comment,  would  itself  be 
a  potent  testimony  to  the  general  con- 
science, for  Christ  and  his  Church. 


FIVE  THEORIES  OF  THE  CHURCH 


FIVE     THEORIES     OF     THE 
CHURCH. 


The  author  of  the  "  Thirteen  Historical 
Discourses  on  the  First  Church  in  New 
Haven"*  vindicates  the  authority  of  that 
church,  organized  by  mutual  agreement  in 
a  meeting  of  the  Christian  people  of  the 
colony,  by  analogy  with  the  civil  govern- 
ment of  the  colony,  organized  in  like  man- 
ner, about  the  same  time.  After  describ- 
ing the  "  plantation-covenant/'  under  which 
as  a  provisional  government  the  colonists 
lived  for  fourteen  months,  the  author  records 
the  meeting  in  Mr.  Newman's  barn,  the 
framing  of  the  church  and  of  the  state,  the 
choosing  of  the  "  seven  pillars,"  and  finally 
the  election  and  ordination  of  the  church 
officers.     He  then  proceeds  as  follows  : — 

"  The  question  doubtless  arises  with  some — 
Could  such  an  ordination  have  any  validity,  or 

*  Thirteen  Historical  Discourses  on  the  completion  of  Two 
Hundred  Years  from  the  Beginning  of  the  First  Church  in 
New  Haven.    By  Leonard  Bacon.    New  Haven,  1838. 


240  FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE  CHURCH. 


confer  on  the  pastor  thus  ordained  any  authority  ? 
Can  men,  by  a  voluntary  compact,  form  themselves 
into  a  church  ?  and  can  the  church  thus  formed 
impart  to  its  own  officers  the  power  of  administer- 
ing ordinances  ?    If  Davenport  had  not  been  pre- 
viously ordained  in  England,  would  not  his  ad- 
ministration of  ordinances  have  been  sacrilege  ? 
Answer  me  another   question  :    How  could    the 
meeting  which  convened  in  Mr.  Newman's  barn, 
originate  a  commonwealth  ?    How  could  the  com- 
monwealth   thus    originated   impart    the    divine 
authority  and  dignity  of  magistrates  to  officers  of 
its  own  election  ?    How  could  a  few  men  coming 
together  here  in  the  wilderness,  without  commis- 
sion from  king  or  parliament,  by  a  mere  volun- 
tary compact  among  themselves,  give  being  to  a 
state  ?    How  can  the  state  thus  instituted  have 
power  to  make  laws  that  shall  bind  the  minority  ? 
What  right  had  they  to  erect  tribunals  of  justice  ? 
What  right  to  wield  the  sword  ?    What  right  to 
inflict  punishment,  even  to  death,  upon  offenders  ? 
Is  not  civil  government  a  divine  institution,  as 
really  as  baptism  and  the  Lord's  supper  ?    I3  not 
the  '  duly  constituted  '  magistrate  as  truly   the 
minister  of  God,   as  he  who   presides  over  the 
church,  and  labors  in  word  and  doctrine  ?  Whence 
then  came  the  authority  with  which  that  self-con- 
stituted state,  meeting  in  Mr.  Newman's  barn,  in- 
vested its  elected  magistrates  ?    It  came  directly 
from  God,  the  only  fountain  of  authority.     Just 
as  directly  from  the  same  God,  came  the  authority 
with  which  the  equally  self-constituted  church, 
meeting  in  the  same  place,  invested  its  elected  pas- 
tor.    Could  the  one  give  to  its  magistrates  power 
to  hang  a  murderer  in  the  name  of  God— and  could 


FIVE   THEORIES  OP   THE   CHURCH.  241 


not  the  other  give  to  its  elders  power  to  adminis- 
ter baptism."* 

The  argument  thus  popularly  stated  is 
sharply  conclusive  ad  hominem  against  those 
who  hold  the  popular  statement  as  to  the 
sanction  of  civil  government.  The  Ameri- 
can idea  of  the  state  implies  the  American 
idea  of  the  church.  The  parity  of  reason- 
ing betwixt  the  two  is  perfect. 

But  the  analogy  here  drawn  is  good  for 
much  more  than  this.  It  has  only  to  be 
cleared  of  expressions  which  point  its  imme- 
diate application  to  a  particular  class  of 
gainsayers,  to  furnish  a  theorem  by  which, 
reasoning  from  sound  principles  in  civil  pol- 
ity, we  may  discover  fallacies,  and  establish 
the  truth,  in  ecclesiastical  polity.  For  sev- 
eral reasons,  let  us  take  the  particular  in- 
stance quoted  above  as  the  text  of  our  whole 
discussion :  first,  because  the  argument 
will  be  clearer  if  stated  in  relation  to  a  par- 
ticular instance  ;  secondly,  because  almost 
the  only  cases  in  which  history  distinctly 
discloses,  side  by  side,  the  origin  and  earli- 
est processes  of  civil  and  of  ecclesiastical 
government,  are  this  and  like  cases  in  early 
American  history  ;  thirdly,  because  the  pas- 
sage quoted  has  actually  been,  in  the  mind 


*  Bacon's  Historical  Discourses,  pp.  41,  42. 


242  FIVE  THEORIES  OP  THE  CHURCH. 

of  the  present  writer,  the  germ  out  of  which 
his  argument  has  grown. 

At  the  outset,  let  us  guard  against  one 
source  of  misapprehension  which  will  be 
more  effectually  obviated  as  the  discussion 
proceeds.  The  church  and  commonwealth 
of  New  Haven  Colony  did  not  originate  in 
the  meeting  in  Mr.  Newman's  barn.  They 
had  existed  at  least  fourteen  months  already. 
The  "  Two  Hundred  Years  from  the  Be- 
ginning of  the  First  Church  in  New  Haven, " 
which  are  commemorated  in  these  discourses, 
date  from  the  landing  of  the  colonists,  not 
from  the  mutual  compact.  And  the  civil 
state  was  coeval  with  the  church.  So  that 
when  it  comes  to  strictness  of  speech,  the 
question,  Can  men  by  voluntary  compact 
form  themselves  into  a  church  ? — and  the 
other  question,  Could  the  meeting  in  Mr. 
Newman's  barn  originate  a  commonwealth  ? 
are  to  be  answered  (so  far  as  the  present  in- 
stance shows)  in  the  negative.  That  meet- 
ing could  not  create  what  was  already  in 
existence.*  What  the  meeting  did  was  to 
organize  both  the  church  and  the  State. 
According  to  "  Congregational  usage"  this 
is  the  same  thing  with  originating  them  ; 

*  That  this  is  the  view  accepted  by  the  author  of  the  '*  Dis- 
courses1' is  sufficiently  implied  both  in  the  title-page  and  in 
the  preface  of  the  volume. 


FIVE  THEORIES   OF  THE  CHURCH.  248 

but  according  to  the  exact  use  of  the  Eng- 
lish language  it  is  something  different. 

Coming  now  to  the  question,  What  was 
the  origin  of  the  New  Haven  Colony  Com- 
monwealth and  Church  ?  and  What  were 
the  source  and  channel  of  their  authority, 
if  any  they  had  ? — there  is  room  for  five 
different  answers,  according  as  the  respond- 
ent holds  one  or  another  of  five  different 
theories  of  polity,  civil  and  ecclesiastical. 
Let  us  name  them  : 

I.  The  Papal  Theory. 
II.  The  Bourbon  Theory. 

III.  The  Formal  Theory. 

IV.  The  Jacobin  Theory. 

V.  The    Rational  and   Scriptural 
Theory. 

I.  The  Papal  Theory. 

It  is  a  * '  fundamental  principle  of  the 
papal  canon  law,  that  the  Roman  pontiff  is 
the  sovereign  lord  of  the  whole  world  ;  and 
that  all  other  rulers  in  church  and  state 
have  so  much  power  as  he  sees  fit  to  allow 
them  to  have."  Under  this  principle,  the 
popes  have  claimed  the  power  "  not  only  of 
conferring  benefices,  but  also  of  giving  away 
empires,  and  likewise  of  divesting  kings  and 
princes  of  their  crowns  and  authority."  * 

tj.  ■         ■!      !■  ■  II  I         ■!■■-—■■■      —  ■  ■—■—■  ■.  .  t 

*  Murdock's  Mosheim,  vol.  ii.,  p.  340. 


24i  FIVE  THEORIES  OF   THE   CHURCH. 


The  theory  thus  set  forth  is  a  very  sim- 
ple and  intelligible  one,  and  its  application 
to  the  case  in  hand  is  nowise  doubtful.  The 
heathen  territory  of  New  England  had  been 
disposed  of  long  before  the  Puritan  migra- 
tion by  the  gift  of  a  pope  to  a  Catholic 
prince,*  and  therefore  whatever  claim  of 
jurisdiction  should  be  set  up  within  that 
territory  by  any  body  of  colonists,  whether 
in  the  name  of  a  charter  from  a  heretic 
power,  or  under  color  of  a  purchase  from 
the  barbarous  tribes  in  possession,  or  under 
pretense  of  a  so-called  inherent  right  of  self- 
government,  must  be  simply  an  intrusion 
and  a  usurpation.  It  would  be  not  only  de- 
void of  right  in  itself,  but  a  violation  of  the 
divine  right  of  the  pope's  grantee. 

In  like  manner,  any  assumption  of  the 
functions  of  the  church  or  ministry  in  this 
colony,  otherwise  than  through  the  ways 
appointed  by  the  head  of  the  church,  would 
be  void  and  invalid,  and  therefore  sacri- 
legious. Furthermore,  it  would  be  schis- 
matic, as  intruding  a  separate  church  au- 
thority within  a  territory  and  population 
already  placed  under  the  special  spiritual 
jurisdiction  of  some  bishop,  or  if  not  so 
placed,  then  remaining  under  the  imme- 
diate pastoral  care  of  the  bishop  of  Rome. 

*  Bancroft's  U.  S.,  vol.  i.,  p.  10. 


FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH.  245 


Obviously,  according  to  this  theory,  the 
first  step  for  the  colonists  to  take  to  secure 
a  regular  and  valid  government,  in  church 
and  state,  is  to  become  reconciled  to  the 
Catholic  Church. 

II.  The  Bourbon  Theory.  This  the- 
ory agrees  with  the  first  mentioned  in  de- 
claring all  lawful  authority,  civil  and  eccle- 
siastical, to  be  derived  from  God  through  a 
continuous  succession  of  men.  It  differs 
from  it  in  this  :  that  whereas  the  former 
holds  that  there  is  but  one  line  of  this  suc- 
cession— the  line  of  the  popes— and  that  to 
all  rightful  secular  and  spiritual  rulers,  in 
any  generation,  their  authority  flows  through 
the  pope  for  the  time  being  : — the  present 
theory  holds  that  the  lines  of  succession  are 
not  one,  but  several ;  that  from  the  original 
conferment,  authority  and  "validity"  de- 
scend along  these  lines,  in  secular  matters 
through  an  hereditary  succession,  in  spir- 
itual matters  through  a  tactual  succession  ; 
that  the  power  of  the  sceptre  and  sword,  or 
the  power  of  the  keys,  as  it  is  not  derivable 
from  the  subjects  thereof,  so  is  not  defeasi- 
ble by  them  ;  and  that  the  question  of  title 
to  authority,  civil  or  ecclesiastical,  is  a  sim- 
ple question  of  pedigree.*    According  to 

*  See  Macaulay's  History  of  England,  Chap.  I. 


246  FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH. 


this  theory,  the  powers  of  the  state  centre 
in  the  sovereign.  The  king,  not  the  pope, 
is  "  the  fountain  of  honor/'  "  Uetat,  c'est 
moi"  says  the  Bourbon ;  "  Ecclesia  in 
Episcopo,"  responds  the  high-churchman. 

In  its  two  applications,  to  church  and  to 
state,  the  lines  of  argument  by  which  this 
theory  is  sustained  are  very  nearly  equal 
and  parallel.  The  state  is  a  divine  institu- 
tion, and  so  is  the  church.  The  ministers 
of  the  one  are  divinely  commissioned,  and 
so  of  the  other.  There  are  difficulties  ob- 
jected in  either  case  to  any  other  external 
credentials  of  the  divine  commission  than 
the  credentials  of  succession  from  former 
ministers.  Those  whose  claims  to  authority 
have  been  founded,  exclusively  or  mainly, 
on*  hereditary  or  tactual  relation  to  their 
predecessors,  have  been  in  a  multitude  of 
cases,  and  for  many  centuries  almost  uni- 
versally, approved  as  lawful  rulers  and  bish- 
ops. The  two  applications  of  the  theory  are 
analogous,  not  only  by  parity  of  reasoning, 
but  by  parity  of  unreasonableness  :  for  in 
either  case  it  is  easier  to  show  the  several 
links  of  the  succession  than  it  is  to  demon- 
strate any  law  of  cohesion  by  which  they  be- 
come a  chain,  or,  the  chain  being  complet- 
ed, to  hitch  it  fast  to  the  original  divine 
commission.     It  may  fairly  enough  be  ad- 


FIVE   THEORIES   OP   THE   CHURCH.  24" 


mitted  that  the  warrant  for  ecclesiastical 
power  in  apostolic  succession,  is  as  well  ac- 
credited, on  the  whole,  as  the  warrant  of 
the  hereditary  divine  right  of  kings. 

Applying  this  theory  to  the  case  in  hand, 
we  find  that  the  only  right  for  the  exercise 
of  government  which  the  settlers  of  New 
England  generally  possessed,  was  such  as 
was  conferred  on  them  by  charter  from  the 
king  of  England.  Under  such  charter,  if 
it  was  broad  enough,  all  the  functions  of 
government  might  be  exercised  by  the  local 
magistrates  in  the  name  of  the  king.  For 
lack  of  such  authority,  the  legislative  and 
judicial  acts  of  the  New  Haven  colonists 
were  null  and  void.  The  only  way  in  which 
regular  and  valid  independent  government 
could  be  set  up  in  the  little  province  of 
Quinipiac,  would  be  for  the  colonists  to  im- 
port the  regularly  descended  heir  of  some 
Lord's  Anointed, — an  Otho,  or  a  grand 
duke  Maximilian — and  graft  their  wild  olive 
with  a  slip  of  a  Stuart  or  a  Bourbon. 

Likewise  in  spiritual  matters,  Davenport 
and  Hooke  might  exercise  such  spiritual 
functions  as  their  ordination  to  the  priest- 
hood by  English  bishops  would  authorize, 
but  could  acquire  no  new  prerogative  from 
any  act  of  a  self-constituted  church.  The 
way  of  maintaining   the  functions  of  the 


248  FIVE   TIIEOEIES   OF   THE   CHURCH. 

■  'I  ■  I1III1M  II  ■  II      —      »^ —  ■  ■     I   -I     — — — — ^— — — — — — ^— — 1— (^ 

church  from  generation  to  generation,  was 
to  obtain  other  priests  and  deacons  from  the 
ordaining  hands  of  the  Bishop  of  London 
(whose  modest  diocese  was  understood  by  a 
mild  fiction  of  law  to  include  a  large  part 
of  the  Western  hemisphere)  ;  or  to  secure, 
either  from  the  lords  spiritual  of  England, 
or  from  the  cracked  succession  of  the  Scotch 
episcopate,  the  gift  of  a  bishop  with  a  pedi- 
gree sixteen  hundred  years  long,  whose 
should  be  all  the  rights  of  ecclesiastical  sov- 
ereignty, to  have  and  to  hold,  and  to  trans- 
mit to  his  assigns  forever.  Both  these 
methods  were  practised  successively  by  a 
few  dissidents  in  the  subsequent  days  of  New 
Haven  ;  by  virtue  of  which  they  became 
the  real  church  of  the  colony,  having  the 
only  "  valid"  and  authorized  ministry.  For 
neglect  of  these,  the  body  of  Christian  peo- 
ple in  the  commonwealth  became  schismatics 
and  aliens  from  the  church,  and  their  so- 
called  ministers  became  guilty  (so  we  are 
assured)  of  the  sin  of  Korah  and  of  Dathan 
and  Abiram. 

III.  The  Formal  Theory. — This  the- 
ory appears  under  very  different  phases  of 
development,  and  is  held  by  very  different 
parties  of  civil  and  ecclesiastical  politicians. 
It  is  that  the  legitimacy,  validity,  or  author- 


FIVE   THEORIES   OP   THE   CHUKCH.  249 

ity  of  a  church  or  of  a  state  are  determined 
by  the  form  of  its  structure.  There  are 
jure-divino  monarchists,  jure-divino  repub- 
licans, and  jure-divino  democrats.  So  also, 
there  are  jure-divino  tri  ordinary  episco- 
palians, jure-divino  presbyterians,  and  jure- 
divino  congregationalists. 

According  to  the  first  classes  in  these  two 
lists,  the  state  government  in  the  Colony  of 
New  Haven  was  hopelessly  vitiated  because 
it  did  not  constitute  Mr.  Eaton  ruler  dur- 
ing his  life,  and  the  head  of  an  hereditary 
dynasty  :  the  church  polity  was  ruined,  be- 
cause the  pastor,  the  teacher,  and  the  ruling 
elder,  instead  of  being  in  three  ranks  in  a 
line  of  promotion,  were  all  in  one  rank. 
And  so,  to  the  other  classes,  the  colonial 
church  and  state  must  stand  or  fall,  in  re- 
spect to  their  divine  sanction,  according  as 
they  agree  with  or  vary  from  a  supposed 
"  pattern  showed  to  Moses  in  the  mount." 
They  came  into  being,  as  divine  institu- 
tions, in  the  act  of  conforming  themselves 
to  the  Scriptural  model ;  or  if  not  so  con- 
formed, they  never  did  come  into  existence 
at  all.* 


*  For  some  severe  animadversions  against  this  test  of 
churchhood— against  "  the  whims  of  theoretic  Biblists"  and 
their  "text-made  churches,"  see  Isaac  Taylor's  Wesley  and 
Methodism,  pp.  199  202. 


2o0  F*VE   THEORIES  OF   THE   CHUKCH. 

IV.  The  Jacobin  Theory. — This  the- 
ory represents  the  body  politic  or  ecclesias- 
tic as  originating  out  of  the  unorganized  and 
unassociated  materials  of  human  society,  by 
a  "social  compact1'  or  "  covenant,"  in 
which  all  the  individuals  agree,  for  the 
common  advantage,  to  surrender  to  the  new 
organization — the  state,  or  the  church — 
sundry  of  their  individual  rights  and  pow- 
ers, to  form  the  common  stock  of  authority 
for  the  corporation.  "  The  whole  body  is 
supposed,  in  the  first  place,  to  have  unani- 
mously consented  to  be  bound  by  the  reso- 
lutions of  the  majority ;  that  majority,  in 
the  next  place,  to  have  fixed  certain  funda- 
mental regulations  ;  and  then  to  have  con- 
stituted, either  in  one  person,  or  in  an  as- 
sembly, a  standing  legislature."* 

According  to  this  theory,  the  colonists  of 
New  Haven,  from  the  time  when  they  came 
out  from  under  the  authority  of  the  ship's 
captain,  at  least  until  the  close  of  their  first 
day  of  fasting  and  prayer,  when  they  formed 
their  provisional  "plantation  covenant," 
were  "in  a  state  of  nature."  They  were 
not  a  community,  but  only  the  individuals 
who  might  become  a  community  whenever 

*  Paley's  Moral  and  Political  Philosophy,  Book  VI.,  chap- 
ter 3.  See  also  Emmons's  Scriptural  Platform  of  Church 
Government. 


FIVE   THEORIES   OP   THE   CHURCH.  2M 


they  should  agree  to  act  in  common.    They 
were  not  society,  but  only  the  raw  materials 
of  society.     There  was  neither  a  common- 
wealth nor  a  church  among  them,  but  only 
the  possibility  of   these.     By-and-by  they 
concluded  to  have  a  state  and  a  church, 
and  so  they  got  together  in  a  barn  and  cre- 
ated them,  appointing  officers  with  divine 
authority  for  administering  the  functions  of 
the  two  institutions— authority  which  up  to 
that  time  had  not  existed  in  the  colony. 
Before  that,  the  execution  of  a  malefactor 
would  have  been  an  act  of  murder,— either 
of  private  revenge  or  of  mob-violence.     De- 
fensive hostilities  against  the  Indians  would 
have  been  simply  the  fighting  of  every  man 
proprio    Marte,    except    so    far    as     indi- 
viduals might  have  chosen  to  club  together 
according  to   their  preference  for  leaders. 
But  any  exercise  of  command  on  the  part 
of  him  to  whom  the  instincts  of  the  people 
should  turn  as  their  natural  military  leader, 
or  any  attempt  to  coerce  the  shirks  and  the 
cowards  into  the  common  defence,  would 
have  been  an  act  of  tyranny  and  usurpa- 
tion, there  having  been  no  unanimous  mu- 
tual agreement  of  the  colonists  to  concede 
their  individual  rights  to  this  extent.     And 
when,  after  experiencing  the  inconveniences 
of  the  "  state  of  nature/'  the  colonists  be- 


252  FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH. 

gan  to  frame  their  covenant,  there  was  no 
right  among  them  to  compel  into  the  ar- 
rangement any  individual  who  preferred,  at 
his  own  risk,  to  live  among  them  but  not  of 
them,  as  a  quiet  and  peaceable  outlaw.  The 
uncovenanted  citizen  might  be  derelict  of  a 
moral  duty  in  thus  standing  aloof  from  the 
mutual  engagements  of  the  rest,  but  the 
powers  arising  out  of  these  mutual  agree- 
ments of  ninety- nine  of  the  population 
could  not  extend  over  the  one -hundredth 
man  who  had  declined  to  be  a  party  to  the 
compact. 

Just  so  the  Christian  people  of  the  colony 
were  not  a  church,  but  only  Christian  indi- 
viduals. The  administration  of  baptism  or 
the  Lord's  Supper,  before  the  covenant, 
would  have  been,  if  not  sacrilegious,  at  least 
a  grave  irregularity,  and  an  infraction  of 
Congregational  order.  The  endeavor  of 
them  that  were  spiritual  to  restore  by  re- 
monstrance and  admonition  a  wandering 
brother,  would  have  been  the  meddling  of 
individuals  in  that  which  they  had  nothing 
to  do  with.  The  individual  would  not  have 
been  bound  to  submit  to  it ;  for  "  the  obli- 
gation to  submit  arises  from  the  bond  of 
the  covenant,"*  and  he  had  never  made 

— 

*  See  Emmons,  who  is  beautifully  explicit  on  this  point, 
Scr.  Platform,  pp.  5,  7. 


FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH.  253 


any  such  contract  with  his  Christian  neigh- 
bors. Any  attempt  to  report  the  recusant 
in  the  weekly  meeting  of  believers  would 
have  been  both  impertinent  and  futile  ;  for 
the  man  never  agreed  to  suffer  any  such  use 
of  his  name,  and  the  stated  meeting  of  Chris- 
tians is  not  a  church,  to  "  tell  it  to,"  be- 
cause the  members  of  it  have  not  formed  a 
social  compact.  The  exolusion  of  an  obsti- 
nate offender  from  the  communion  of  saints 
is  a  sheer  impossibility,  because  the  saints 
do  not  have  any  communion.  They  are 
men  of  grace  in  a  "  state  of  nature."  If, 
at  length,  the  colonists  hold  a  meeting  in 
Mr.  Newman's  barn  to  arrange  the  terms  of 
an  association  for  mutual  care,  and  contrive 
a  covenant  which  should  confer  on  the 
members  and  officers  of  the  institution  the 
divine  right  of  enforcing  a  contract,  it  is 
optional  with  those  who  find  themselves  in- 
commoded by  too  much  "  watch-care," 
whether  they  will  enter  into  this  covenant, 
or  whether  they  will  remain  as  lookers  on, 
or  whether  they  will  form  a  little  separate 
mutual  covenant  among  themselves. 

V.  The  Rational  and  Scriptural 
Theory.— This  theory,  as  applied  to  the 
civil  state,  avoids  encountering  the  hypo- 
thetical difficulties  suggested   in  what  we 


254  FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH. 

have  called  the  Jacobin  theory,  by  simply 
recognizing  the  facts  of  human  nature. 
The  questions  whether  an  aggregation  of 
human  beings  living  together  without  any 
mutual  interests  or  intercourse  is  a  com- 
munity or  commonwealth  ; — whether  "  in- 
dividuals are  a  civil  society  before  they  have 
formed  themselves  into  one," — whether 
"  unconnected  individuals,  before  they  have 
laid  themselves  under  a  mutual  engage- 
ment' '  *  are  the  subjects  of  any  common 
authority — are  futile  questions  :  as  if  one 
should  ask  whether  a  pile  of  quicksilver 
globules  would  constitute  a  pool  of  quick- 
silver before  being  flattened  down  ;  know- 
ing that  it  is  the  nature  of  globules  of  quick- 
silver, not  to  stand  in  a  pile  like  cannon- 
balls,  but  to  flow  together  upon  contact. 
A  battue  of  lions  in  an  inclosure  is  not  a 
herd  of  lions,  no  matter  what  discipline  you 
may  put  them  under,  for  the  lion  is  not  a 
gregarious  animal.  But  a  collection  of 
horses  or  of  sheep  is  a  herd,  or  a  flock,  at 
once,  without  waiting  to  adjust  the  terms 
of  an  agreement,  or  to  secure  the  valid  in- 
vestiture or  ascertain  the  pedigree  of  the 
bellwether,  because  horses  and  sheep  are 
gregarious.     You  do  not  have  to  constitute 


*  Emmons,  Script.  Platform,  p.  4. 


FIVE   THEORIES   OP   THE   CHURCH.  2 


aoo 


them  a  herd,—  they  are  a  herd.  Just  so,  if 
you  gather  human  beings  together  in  a  sepa- 
rate population,  you  do  not  have  to  make 
society  out  of  them.  They  are  society,  be- 
cause man  is  a  social  animal.  And  wher- 
ever human  society  is,  there  are  to  be  found, 
either  potentially  or  in  actual  exercise,  all 
the  divine  power  and  authority  of  the 
State. 

And   all   the    questions   that   are   raised 
among  the  other  conflicting  theories  of  the 
State,    as   to  the  conditions,   channel   and 
credentials  of  divine  authority  residing  in 
the  rulers  of  the  State,  are  shortly  disposed 
of,  according  to  the  rational  and  Scriptural 
view,  by  recurring  to    that    fundamental 
maxim,  "  The  powers  that  be  are  ordained 
of  God."     The  government   de  facto,  by 
virtue  of  its  being  the  power,  is  charged  by 
the  Divine  ruler  with  the  responsibility  of 
administering  justice  in  the   land,  and   is 
entitled  to  be  respected  and  obeyed  accord- 
ingly.    This  is  the  sole  condition  on  which 
divine  authority  is  conferred  on  the  govern- 
ment of  any  country— that  it  be  the  govern- 
ment.    With  this  agrees  the  maxim,  in  its 
only  true  meaning,  that  "  all  governments 
derive  their  just  powers  from  the  consent 
of  the  governed;"    since  if  this  consent, 
whether  voluntary  or  coerced,  active  or  pas- 


256  FIVE   THEORIES   OF  THE   CHURCH. 

sive,  is  withdrawn,  the  power  that  was  is  no 
longer  the  power,  and  God  does  not  ordain 
the  impotencies.  Without  the  actual  pos- 
session of  the  power,  no  degree  of  de  jure 
11  validity*'  amounts  to  a  divine  commis- 
sion ; — not  bulls  from  a  pope,  nor  pedigrees 
running  back  to  King  David  himself,  nor 
any  degree  of  ideal  perfection  in  the  struc- 
ture of  constitution,  nor  any  certificates  of  a 
social  compact  in  a  mass- meeting.  But, 
the  power  being  present,  not  the  absence  of 
any  or  all  of  these  conditions  can  discharge 
the  de  facto  government  of  its  responsibility, 
nor  release  the  individual  from  his  dutv  of 
subjection  and  obedience.  Of  course  this 
statement  is  not  to  be  interpreted  to  mean 
that  all  methods  of  acquiring  civil  power 
are  right,  nor  that  there  is  no  preference 
among  forms  of  government ;  neither  is  it 
to  be  applied  to  the  exclusion  of  the  duty  of 
disobedience  to  laws  requiring  sin,  or  of  the 
right  of  revolution.  But  properly  inter- 
preted and  applied,  this  view  of  civil  duty 
and  authority  is  the  settled  result  of  Chris- 
tian ethics. 

Moreover,  there  always  is  an  "  existing 
power,"  residing  in  every  community  of 
men,  latent  if  not  active,  which,  whenever 
on  any  emergency  it  is  called  into  exercise 
for  the  punishment-  of  crime  or  the  protec- 


FIVE    THEORIES   OF   THE   CHOUGH.  25? 

tion  of  innocence,  carries  with  it  the  sanc- 
tion of  God. 

Applying  these  principles  to  the  case  of 
the  New  Haven  Oolonv,  we  find  that  before 
the  "  constituent  assembly' '  in  the  barn, 
before  the  "■plantation-covenant,"  the  col- 
ony was  already  a  state  ;  *  and  so  any  male- 
factor who  should  have  presumed  upon 
prevalent  social  theories  to  violate  public  or 
private  rights  or  religious  duties  at  that 
early  period,  would  summarily  have  found 
it  to  be.  His  judgment  would  not  a  long 
time  have  lingered,  nor  his  condemnation 
have  slumbered,  waiting  for  a  social  com- 
pact to  confer  the  authority  of  a  magistrate. 

The  divine  right  of  government  residing 
in  the    little    commonwealth,   might  have 


*  "If  a  ship  at  sea  should  lose  all  its  officers,  or  a  ship- 
wrecked crew  be  cast  upon  a  desert  island,  this  little  commu- 
nity would  then  stand  in  the  condition  of  a  State.  The  whole 
would  have  the  right  to  restrain  and  constrain  each  one  for 
the  freedom  of  all."— Hickok's  Moral  Science,  p.  219. 

It  is  necessary  to  guard  against  confusion  between  a  State 
and  &  State  government  The  State  government  is  the  out- 
growth or  ordinance  of  the  State.  But,  by  a  natural  me- 
tonymy, the  word  State  is  often  used  to  mean  the  government. 

The  students  of  "  the  judicious  Hooker"  will  remember 
a  passage  in  the  "Ecclesiastical  Polity"  strikingly  parallel 
to  the  above  from  President  Hickok.  Itmay  seriously  be  doubt- 
ed whether  Hooker,  if  he  had  found  himself  in  New  England, 
would  have  felt  that  his  principles  allowed  of  the  course  of 
nonconformity  and  schism  which  has  sometimes  been  pursued 
by  those  who  call  themselves  his  disciples  and  justify  th«i? 
practices  by  quoting  his  book. 


258  FIVE  THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH. 


come  into  exercise  and  manifestation,  in 
various  ways.  Successive  emergencies  might 
have  occasioned  successive  acts  of  authority, 
nemine  obstante,  which  might  have  become 
precedents  for  others,  and  so  a  body  of  com- 
mon law,  and  a  sort  of  British  Constitution, 
have  grown  up,  without  one  act  of  deliber- 
ate legislation  or  foundation.  The  defer- 
ence toward  Eaton  might,  either  explicitly 
or  by  the  general  acquiescence,  have  com- 
mitted to  him  the  supreme  government  of 
the  colony,  and  at  his  death  have  trans- 
ferred it  to  his  son.  Or  the  long-continued 
pressure  of  military  exigencies  might  have 
habituated  the  people  to  martial  law  and 
settled  their  military  leader  into  the  seat  of 
general  authority.  All  these  modes  of  the 
origin  of  governmental  institutions  in  the 
colony  are  imaginable  ;  and  in  any  of  them 
might  have  been  inaugurated  the  power  or- 
dained of  God.  The  method  of  sitting  down 
consciously  and  deliberately  to  contrive  the 
institutions  under  which  the  inherent  au- 
thority of  the  state  should  express  itself,  is 
doubtless  a  nobler  way  ;  a  way  worthier  of 
such  matured  and  reflective  minds  as  set  up 
the  pillars  of  the  New  Haven  Colony— a 
way  which  has  since  become  so  exclusively 
the  typical  American  way  of  organizing  gov- 
ernment that  we  are  tempted  to  think  it  the 


FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH.  259 


only  way  ;  but  it  is  not  one  whit  more  valid 
in  conferring  divine  authority  than  the  way 
practised  in  the  insurrection  on  the  slaver 
Amistad,  when  the  tallest,  nimblest  and 
smartest  negro  in  the  lot  elected  himself 
captain  and  king,  and  exacted  and  received 
the  obedience  of  the  rest. 

Now  bringing  the  force  of  this  extended 
analogy  to  bear  on  our  main  subject  of  the 
origin  and  authority  of  the  church,  we  see 
at    once    the    futility   of    those    questions 
whether  a  neighborhood  of  "  visible  saints" 
"  living  members  of  Christ/'  while  "  sepa- 
rate and  unconnected,"  constitute  a  church 
of  Christ  ;  *  whether  "  a  number  of  Chris- 
tians merely  living  in  the  same  city,  town 
or  parish,"  f  but  having  no  common  inter- 
ests, no  mutual  affections,  no  stated  meet- 
ings, and    holding  themselves   aloof  from 
mutual    intercourse,    are    a  church.     The 
questions  are  predicated  on  an  unsupposable 
hypothesis.     That  is  not  the  way  in  which 
"  visible  saints1'  live.     When  they  try  to 
live  so,  their  sanctity  becomes  invisible  at 
once.     They  are  no  more,  "  visible  saints," 
but  visibly  unsanctified.    "  By  this  we  know 
that  we  have  passed  from  death  unto  life, 
because  we  love  the  brethren."    The  prob- 


*  Scr.  Platform,  p.  3.  f  Idem.  p.  5,  and  passim. 


260  FIVE   THEORIES   OP   THE   CHURCH. 


lem  in  theology  that  begins  with  supposing 
a  neighborhood  of  Christians  without  mu- 
tual love  and  intercourse  under  the  law  of 
Christ,  is  as  rational  as  a  problem  in  mag- 
netism which  should  be  founded  on  the  sup- 
position of  a  collection  of  steel  magnets 
having  attraction  toward  the  pole,  but  no 
attraction  for  each  other.  If,  under  the 
laws  of  human  nature,  human  neighborhood 
implies  human  society,  and  human  society 
implies  the  state  ;  then  d  fortiori,  under 
the  laws  of  the  regenerated  nature,  Chris- 
tian neighborhood  implies  Christian  society, 
and  Christian  society  implies  the  church. 
The  law  of  Christ  concerning  common  and 
mutual  Christian  duties  is  already  in  force, 
and  the  authority  of  administering  its  earth- 
ly sanctions  resides  with  the  community  of 
Christians.* 

As  touching  the  credentials  of  govern- 
ment in  the  church,  it  is  hard  to  see  where- 

*  It  is  amazing  to  see  Dr.  Emmons  walking  straight  for- 
ward, with  his  eyes  open,  into  the  absurdity  that  the  law  of 
Christ  begins  to  be  binding  on  Christian  disciples  only  when 
they  have  mutually  agreed  to  be  bound  by  it ;  and,  by  impli- 
cation, that  it  is  binding  then  only  within  the  bodies  that  may 
be  formed  by  "  elective  affinity,"  pp.  4,  5. 

Quite  in  accordance  with  the  Doctor's  exegesis  of  Matthew 
xviii.  15-17,  is  the  common  construction  of  the  same  passage, 
which  holds  it  to  be  a  sin  to  report  an  offending  brother  in  the 
lecture-room  of  the  church  until  after  the  "  first  and  second 
steps,"  but  holds  it  permissible  to  advertise  him  "  at  sight"  in 
the  religious  newspapers. 


FIVE   THEOKIES  OP   THE   CHURCH.  261 

in  the  principle  to  be  applied  differs  from 
that  which  obtains  respecting  civil  govern- 
ment. Under  the  latter,  the  individual  is 
required  to  ' '  submit  himself  to  the  powers 
that  be."  Under  the  former,  he  is  required 
to  "  obey  them  that  have  the  rule  over 
him."  In  either  case,  the  wide  generality 
of  the  command,  interpreted  by  the  inspired 
absence  of  express  instruction  as  to  the 
method  of  appointing  and  inducting  valid 
officers,  points  to  a  like  conclusion  : — that, 
under  the  necessary  and  obvious  limitations, 
a  de  facto  government,  in  church  as  in 
state,  is  entitled  to  the  allegiance  of  its  sub- 
jects. 

The  illustration  of  this  view  by  the  in- 
stance of  the  New  Haven  Colony  is  so  obvi- 
ous that  it  is  needful  only  to  hint  the  main 
points  of  it.  The  church  which,  according 
to  the  uniform  laws  of  the  Christian  life, 
had  crystallized  out  of  the  ship's  company 
during  the  voyage,  having  only  such  slight, 
informal  organization  as  the  circumstances 
of  that  temporary  mode  of  life  required, 
was  not  dissolved  when  the  colonists  land- 
ed. It  was  the  church  authority  subsisting 
among  them  already,  which  was  expressed 
in  the  "  plantation- covenant."  When, 
afterward,  the  town  was  "cast  into  several 
private  meetings  wherein  they  that  dwelt 


262  FIVE  THEORIES  OF  THE   CHURCH. 


most  together  gave  their  accounts  one  to 
another  of  God's  gracious  work  upon  them, 
and  prayed  together,  and  conferred  to  mu- 
tual edification/'  and  thus  "  had  knowl- 
edge, one  of  another, ' '  and  of  the  fitness  of 
individuals  for  their  several  places,  in  the 
foundation- work,  or  in  the  superstructure* 
— it  is  possible  that  they  supposed  they  were 
preparing  to  originate  the  church  ;  but  it  is 
plain  to  the  looker-on  that  the  very  act  of 
"  casting  the  town  into  meetings"  was  an 
act  of  the  church.  And  the  action  of  the 
"  constituent  assembly"  in  the  barn  was, 
like  the  adoption  of  our  present  national  con- 
stitution, not  the  founding  of  a  new  church 
or  state,  but  the  peaceful  revolution  of  one 
already  in  being.  The  Constitution  does 
not  make  the  state ;  the  state  makes  the 
Constitution. 

If,  within  the  territory  occupied  by  the 
colony,  a  knot  of  theorizers  on  politics  had 
conspired  to  form  a  separate  mutual  com- 
pact for  civil  government  among  them- 
selves, to  use  a  different  code  of  laws  upon 
their  members,  and  to  secure  a  purer  democ- 
racy or  a  legitimately  descended  ruler,  the 
proper  name  for  the  act  would  have  been 
sedition.     Precisely    so,    when    dissenters 


*  Bacon's  Historical  Discourses,  p.  19. 


FIVE   THEORIES  OF   THE   CHURCH.  263 

from  the  colonial  church  did,  for  no  griev- 
ance put  upon  their  conscience,  but  simply 
in  the  prosecution  of  their  church  theories 
or  prejudices,  split  themselves  from  the  con- 
gregation, and  refuse  obedience  to  the  exist- 
ing government — "to  them  that  had  the 
rule" — and  insist  on  importing  for  their 
special  use  a  hierarch  in  the  regular  succes- 
sion, the  proper  name  for  their  act  was 
schism. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  let  it  be  confessed 
that  if  the  colonial  Church  had  undertaken 
to  exclude  from  its  fellowship  Christian  dis- 
ciples, for  causes  not  demanding  the  cen- 
sure of  the  Church  nor  discrediting  the 
profession  of  a  Christian  faith — if  they  had 
reversed  the  gospel  principle,  and  proceed- 
ed on  the  notion  that  it  is  better  that  ten 
weak  disciples  should  be  excluded  than  that 
one  deceiver  should  be  admitted — if  thus 
they  had  created  outside  of  their  com- 
munion a  party  of  Christians  whose  only 
opportunity  of  fellowship  was  in  a  separate 
organization  ;  then  the  sin  of  schism  would 
have  rested  on  the  heads  not  of  the  few,  but 
of  the  many.  The  Church  itself  would 
have  become  schigmatic.  But  it  is  fair  to 
say  that  this  does  not  seem  to  have  been  the 
sin  of  the  churches  of  the  first  nor  of  the 
second  generation.     The  general  prevalence 


264  FIVE   THEORIES  OF   THE   CHURCH. 


of  it  in  New  England  is  comparatively 
modern. 

OBJECTION'S    TO    THIS    THEORY    OF    THE 

Church. — The  objections  to  be  levied 
against  what  we  have  called  the  Rational 
and  Scriptural  Theory  of  the  Church  will 
exactly  correspond  with  those  which  have 
been  raised,  to  no  effect,  against  the  anal- 
ogous theory  of  civil  polity.  They  may  be 
treated  with  great  brevity. 

Objection  1.  The  principle  proposed,  of 
the  duty  of  deference  to  the  de  facto  govern- 
ment of  the  Christian  community,  cannot 
be  accompanied  with  any  distinct  and  defi- 
nite limitation,  by  which  the  occasional  ex- 
ceptions in  favor  of  disobedience  or  revolu- 
tion can  be  determined. 

The  answer  to  this  is  to  be  found,  not 
only  in  the  parallel  doctrine  and  objection 
in  civil  polity,  but  "  in  almost  every  part  of 
ethical  science."  So  rarely  is  the  exact 
boundary  between  right  and  wrong  to  be 
distinctly  defined  in  a  formula — so  gener 
ally  are  the  final  questions  on  the  applica- 
tion of  moral  rules  left  open  for  the  deci- 
sion of  the  individual  conscience — that  there 
is  a  prim  a  facie  presumption  against  any  at- 
tempt to  fix  the  course  of  right  action  on  a 
point  of  morals  by  a  formula  of  permanent 


FIVE   THEORIES  OF   THE   CnURCH.  205 

and  universal  application.*  The  objection 
is  a  clear  argument  in  our  favor. 

Objection  2.  Under  the  doctrine  here  laid 
down,  it  will  be  impossible  to  justify  the 
Puritan  separations  from  the  Church  of 
England. 

The  first  answer  which  we  would  make  to 
this  is  that  it  is  a  small  matter  to  answer 
it  at  all.  The  second,  that  a  true  judgment 
on  those  acts  of  separation  must  depend,  on 
the  circumstances  surrounding  each  act ;  on 
the  character  of  the  parish  church  from 
which  the  separatists  withdrew — whether  it 
was  Christian  or  unchristian  ;  on  the  na- 
ture of  the  grievances  under  which  they 
labored,  whether  mere  annoyances  or  actual 
burdens  on  the  conscience  ;  on  the  proba- 
bility of  bringing  the  body  of  the  Christian 
disciples  in  that  community  into  union 
under  a  purer  rule.  The  third  answer  is 
that  if  it  does  condemn  the  secession  of  dis- 
senters from  the  Church  of  England,  it 
thereby  honors  and  confirms  the  judgment 
of  our  Puritan  forefathers  of  the  best  and 
earliest  age,  almost  all  of  whom,  except  the 
Pilgrims  of  Plymouth,  abhorred  the  schism 
of  the  separatists  with  a  holy  horror.     The 


*  See  the  ample  illustration  of  this  matter,  in  its  political 
bearing,  in  Macaulay's  History  of  England,  Vol.  ii.,  pp.  103-5, 
Harper's  12mo  edition. 


2G6  FIVE  THEORIES  OP   THE  CHURCH 


fourth  answer  will  be  conclusive  in  many 
minds,— that  the  doubt  which  it  throws  over 
the  Puritan  separations  in  England  is  more 
than  compensated  by  the  discredit  which  it 
puts  upon  many  of  the  Baptist,  Episco- 
palian, and  Methodist  schisms  in  New 
England. 

Objection  3.  This  view  discredits  many 
of  the  local  efforts  for  the  propagation  of 
Congregational  institutions  at  the  West  and 
elsewhere,  as  schismatic. 
Ansiver.  Very  likely. 
Objection  4.  This  view  brings  in  practi- 
cal difficulty  and  confusion,  by  making  it 
often  a  matter  of  doubt  what  is  the  Church 
of  Christ  in  any  community,  and  where  its 
government  resides. 

Answer.  This  difficulty  is  not  peculiar  to 
the  ecclesiastical  application  of  the  theory. 
It  is  of  frequent  occurrence  in  civil  politics. 
Hardly  ever  is  there  a  revolution  or  a  con- 
siderable attempt  at  revolution,  in  which  it 
does  not  become  a  very  important  and  very 
perplexing  question  to  some  cod  sciences — 
Which  are  "  the  powers  that  be  ?"  It  is  a 
question  not  only  for  the  passive  and  indif- 
ferent, but  for  the  active  leaders  of  revolu- 
tion—first whether  there  is  ground  and  need 
for  revolution,  and  then  whether  the  dissat- 
isfaction of  the  people,  the  incapacity  of  the 


FIVE   THEORIES   OF   THE   CHURCH.  26' 


administration,    and    the    combination    of 
favoring   circumstances  have  or   have   not 
charged  them  with  the  power,  and  with  a 
trust  for  the  redress  of  intolerable  griev- 
ances, to  the  discharge  of  which  they  are 
ordained  of  God.     Not  to  allude  to  ques- 
tions which  often  arose  to  perplex  honest 
consciences  during  our  own  civil  war,  the  his- 
tory of   the    mission  of   Dudley  Maun  to 
Hungary,   in    quest    of  a   government    to 
recognize,  is  one  case  in  point.     Another  is 
the  amusing  story  of  Mr.  John  L.  Stepheus, 
whose  Travel  was  never  so  full  of  Incidents 
as  when,  with  a  diplomatic  commission  in 
his  pocket,  he  explored  the  various  factions 
of  a  Spanish  American  republic,  in  search 
of  the  right  government  to  which  to  pre- 
sent it.* 

It  cannot  invalidate  the  principle  which 
we  have  enunciated,  that  such  difficulties 
are  more  frequent  in  ecclesiastical  politics 
than  in  civil.  In  secular  matters,  the  neces- 
sities of  society  are  such  that  the  rival  pre- 
tensions of  different  claimants  to  the  su- 
preme government  within  the  same  terri- 
tory become  a  nuisance  so  odious  as  not  to 
be  tolerable  for  an  indefinitely  protracted 


*  Incidents  of  Travel  in  Central  America,  Chiapas  and  Yu- 
catan.    By  John  L.  Stephens. 


208  FIVE  THEORIES   OF   THE  CHURCH. 

period  ;  and  as  for  the  settlement  of  these 
claims  by  allowing  each  claimant  to  govern 
its  own  partisans  according  to  its  own  laws, 
the  plan  is  so  unnatural,  so  inimical  to  the 
peace  of  the  community,  that  history  has 
shown  no  disposition  to  repeat  the  solitary 
instance  of  it  which  is  found  in  the  present 
constitution  of  the  Turkish  empire,  tem- 
pered though  it  is,  in  that  instance,  by  the 
beneficent  rigors  of  a  supervising  despotism. 
But  the  union  and  communion  of  all  the 
Christian  disciples  of  any  community,  in- 
stead of  being,  like  political  union,  a  neces- 
sity, is  only  a  duty.  Consequently  when 
once  factions  have  established  themselves  in 
the  Christian  commonwealth,  there  is  no 
necessary  limit  to  their  continuance  from 
year  to  year,  and  from  generation  to  gen- 
eration. In  the  course  of  time  the  Chris- 
tian mind  becomes  so  wonted,  and  the 
Christian  conscience  so  seared,  to  the  wrong 
and  evil  of  schism,  that  the  doctrine  of  the 
perpetuity  of  schism  is  accepted  as  an  in- 
tegral part  of  the  "evangelical  scheme,' ' 
and  the  sacred  name  of  the  Church  loses  its 
proper  meaning,  of  the  commonwealth  of 
God's  people,  and  becomes  synonymous  with 
its  old  opposite,  a  ulpeois  or  sect.  The 
"problem  of  Christian  union/'  which  in 
the  beginning  no  one  ever  thought  of  call- 


FIVE   THEORIES   OP   THE   CHURCH.  209 


ing  a  problem,  is  held  to  be  soluble  only  by 
diplomatic  dealings  between  these  churches 
(which  are  not  churches),  or  else  by  setting 
up  in  the  vacant  place  formerly  held  by  the 
church,  a  new  institution — a  Young  Men's 
Christian  Association,  or  a  Catholic  Basis 
City  Tract  Society— that  shall  be  the  centre 
of  Catholic  affection  and  the  means  of  the 
communion  of  saints. 

In  this  state  of  a  Christian  neighborhood, 
doubtless  the  question,  Where  is  the  church  ? 
is  a  difficult  one.     One  thing  about  it  is 
plain,  that  it  is  not  to  be  settled  by  apply- 
ing  worn-out  tests,  such  as  papal  authority, 
apostolic  succession,  structural  perfection, 
or  democratic  origin  to  any  fragment  of  the 
schism,   and   determining  that   to   be   the 
Church.     In  some  cases,  it  will  appear  that 
there   is  a  Catholic  church  in  the  place, 
from  which    seditious    spirits    have    torn 
themselves  away  in  wanton  schism.     Some- 
times, that  the  different  churches,  separate 
in  name  and  form,  are  united  in  substance 
and  spirit,  that  their  several  pastors,  co- 
operating in  every  good  word  and  work,  are 
really  a  presbytery  or  college  of  ministers 
for  the  one  Church  of  Christ  in  the  town. 
Sometimes  it  will  appear  that  the  Catholic 
Tract  Society  has  become  a  sort  of  church 
without  ordinances,  and  that  the  president 


270  FIVE   THEORIES   OP   THE   CHURCH. 

of  the  Society  is  actual  bishop  of  the  town. 
But  more  commonly  the  most  that  can  be 
said  is  that  the  church  in  such  a  community 
is  existing  in  a  state  of  schism  ;  as,  in  the 
Rome  of  the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  centu- 
ries, the  authority  of  the  state  might  prop- 
erly be  described  as  dispersed  among  a  num- 
ber of  families  and  factions.  And  the  best 
that  any  one  can  do  in  such  a  case,  is,  while 
joining  himself  in  special  fellowship  where 
he  will  lend  himself  least  to  the  encourage- 
ment of  faction,  always  to  hold  hie  supreme 
allegiance  to  be  due  to  the  interests  and  au- 
thority of  the  whole  family  that  is  named  of 
Christ. 

It  is  much  in  favor  of  any  theory  on  such 
a  subject  as  the  one  which  we  have  in  hand, 
that  its  chief  difficulties  lie  in  matters  of 
application  and  detail.  In  these  matters 
we  would  not  speak  with  too  much  confi- 
dence. We  may  have  wrought  unsuccess- 
fully in  developing  and  applying  the  analogy 
which  is  the  theme  of  our  article.  But  we 
reach  the  close  of  the  discussion  with  in- 
creased confidence  that  in  the  just  treatment 
of  this  analogy  lies  the  only  hope  of  solving 
the  problems  of  ecclesiastical  polity. 


THE  RESTORATION  OF   THE    PROT- 
ESTANT EPISCOPAL  CHURCH  TO 
CATHOLIC  FELLOWSHIP 


RESTORATION  OF  THE 

PROTESTANT    EPISCOPAL 

CHURCH 

TO  CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP. 


That  man  will  deserve  well  of  the  theo- 
logical world  who  shall  write,  sympatheti- 
cally but  critically,  the  hitherto  unwritten 
history  of  the  projects  and  tentatives  of 
Christian  union.  To  be  complete,  such  a 
history  would  have  to  go  very  far  back  to- 
ward the  apostolic  age  ;  for  the  effort  after 
union  is  doubtless  nearly  coeval  with  the 
tendency  to  schism  ;  only,  in  the  spiritual 
system,  it  is  a  sorrowful  fact  that  down  to 
our  time  the  centripetal  force  has  seemed  to 
be  overbalanced  by  the  centrifugal.  But 
the  most  accessible  part  of  the  story,  the 
most  instructive  and  practically  useful  to 
the  church  of  the  present  day,  is  that  part 
which  begins  with  the  first  rendings  of  the 
Lutheran  Reformation.  The  student  who 
should  enter  upon  this  interesting  task 
would  be  liable  to  some  surprises  at  discov- 
ering how  many  and  important  are  the  facts 
and  how  considerable  the  literature  pertain- 


274  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 


ing  to  it.  A  better  contribution  to  the 
cause  of  Christian  union  could  hardly  be 
made  than  by  some  such  large  review  as  we 
have  suggested. 

The  motives  that  have  incited  to  Chris- 
tian union  have  been  diverse  and  often 
mixed,  and  have  taken  a  long  range,  from 
the  highest  downward.  Sensitiveness  for 
the  honor  of  the  church  and  high  loyalty 
to  its  Head,  love  of  the  brethren,  zeal  for 
the  more  effective  advancement  of  the  king- 
dom of  God— motives  like  these  mingle  or 
alternate  throughout  this  curious  history, 
with  ambitions  for  a  splendid  and  dominat- 
ing hierarchy  and  Babel- plans  of  spiritual 
despotism,  with  aspirations  after  sectarian 
aggrandizement,  and  even  with  ugly  ani- 
mosities against  one's  fellow-Christians. 
Strange  and  abhorrent  as  the  paradox  may 
seem,  it  is  a  not  infrequent  thing  in  history 
to  find  plans  of  church  union  or  federation 
springing  from  the  spirit  of  schism,  just  as 
international  alliances,  offensive  and  defen- 
sive, are  apt  to  be  concluded  when  war  is 
impending  or  intended.  The  holy  sacra- 
ment of  communion  has  been,  in  every  age 
of  church  history,  desecrated  as  the  occasion 
of  quarrel  and  mutual  repulsion.  From  the 
beginning  of  them,  the  symbols  of  the  Chris- 
tian faith  have  been  studiously  contrived  as 


AND    CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  275 

f — ■ '  "  ' 

ecbols  for  the  "  tiring  out"  of  certain  Chris- 
tians.* It  admits  of  doubt  whether  any 
form  of  confession  or  any  plan  of  church 
union  has  ever  been  proposed  without  a  dis- 
tinct recognition,  either  with  regret  or  with 
glee,  of  the  classes  of  Christians  who  were 
to  be  excluded  by  it.  Plans  of  Christian 
union  at  their  best  and  broadest  have  been 
plans  for  the  union  of  almost  all  Christians, 
and  generally  plans  purposely  contrived  for 
the  exclusion  of  some  Christians,  or  for  ad- 
mitting them  under  severe  exactions. 

It  may  justly  be  said  of  the  basis  of 
church  union  proposed  by  the  bishops  of 
the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  Eng- 
land and  in  the  United  States,  that  it  is  as 
respectable  in  its  motive  and  its  source,  and 
as  worthy  in  itself,  as  any  of  its  predecessors. 
It  is  one  of  the  happiest  of  many  indica- 
tions of  the  great  advance  of  that  denomi- 
nation, especially  in  the  United  States,  in 
every  measurement  of  progress.  In  num- 
bers, in  wealth  and  influence,  in  intellectual 
and  spiritual  power,  in  true  evangelistic 
zeal,  in  courage  against  public  wrongs,  and 

*  One  of  the  earliest  of  these  formulas  was  contrived  by 
Bishop  Cyprian  with  a  phrase  which,  he  flattered  himself, 
would  have  the  effect  to  keep  the  Novations  out  of  the  church — 
men  who  had  incurred  his  just  disapproval  for  their  attempt 
to  keep  cert/- in  other  Christians  out.  See  Epist  lxxvi,  to 
Magnus. 


276  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 


pre-eminently  in  the  difficult  work  of  city 
parishes,  it  has  made  such  advances  in  the 
last  fifty  years  as  hardly  any  other  sect  of 
the  American  Church  has  made.  And  it 
has  shown  itself  able  to  bear  this  prosperity. 
Gaining  in  real  self-respect,  it  has  learned 
respect  for  others.  Less  and  less  do  we 
hear  of  a  certain  snobbish  pride  in  maintain- 
ing an  elegant  exclusiveness  toward  its 
neighbors,  joined  with  impressive  allu- 
sions to  its  distinguished  relations  in  foreign 
parts.  The  most  reluctant  gainsayer  is 
forced  to  recognize  the  evidences  of  a  re- 
vival of  religion,  in  the  highest  sense  of 
that  phrase,  pervading  the  whole  body. 
And  among  these  evidences  of  revival  none 
is  more  divinely  attested  than  this,  "  that 
they  love  the  brethren." 

A  most  honorable  and  hopeful  sign  in  the 
Episcopal  Church  of  to-day  is  its  "  sacred 
discontent"  with  its  peculiarly  isolated  posi- 
tion. It  may  be  said,  indeed,  with  some 
justice,  that  this  isolation  in  which  it  has 
stood  so  long,  cut  off  on  all  sides  from  for- 
mal communion  with  fellow- Christians,  has 
been  by  its  own  fault ;  would  it  not  be  fair 
to  recognize  that  its  own  virtue  has  had 
something  to  do  with  it  ?  If  it  has  cut  it- 
self quite  loose  from  the  church  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  has  not  this  fact  been 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  277 


incidental,  or,  rather,  accidental,  to  a  praise- 
worthy zeal  for  keeping  up  close  relations 
with  the  church  of  the  fourth  century  ?     If 
it  has  seemed  sometimes  to  neglect  the  ordi- 
nary courtesies  toward  its  immediate  neigh- 
bors,  is  not  something  to  be  pardoned  to  the 
assiduity  with  which  it  has  sought,  however 
unsuccessfully,  for  recognition  and  acts  of 
fellowship  in  the  ends  of  the  earth  ?     Is  it 
not  proving  itself  a  true  vine,  wholly  a  right 
seed,  when,  having  so  long  reached  its  ten- 
drils  toward  the   East  and  found  nothing 
offered  for  it  to  cling  to  (except  the  Old 
Catholics,  if  there  are  any  of  them  left),  it 
begins  to  turn  with  some  sincere  yearnings  of 
heart  to  those  toward  whom  it  has  hitherto 
cultivated  a  certain  aloofness   of  attitude  ? 
It  marks  a  dangerous  stage  in  the  process  of 
freezing,  when    one  loses  the  sensation  of 
cold  ;  it  is  a  symptom  of  the  new  and  more 
vigorous  life  which  is  pulsating  in  the  Prot- 
estant Episcopal  organization,  that  the  con- 
sciousness comes  back  to  it  of  the  chilliness 
of  its  practical  separation  from  the  Holy 
Catholic  Church,  the  communion  of  saints. 
The  dominating  motive  and  spirit  of  the 
Protestant  bishops  in  proposing  "  Articles 
of  Church  Unity"  seems  wholly  right,  hon- 
orable, and  Christian. 

This  being  so,  there  is  no  good  reason  for 


278  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL  CHURCH 

being  captious  about  the  manner  of  it.  If 
it  seems  to  any  to  have,  as  enunciated  at 
Chicago,  the  air  of  an  invitation  to  the 
mountain  to  come  to  Mohammed,  it  is  well 
to  remember  that  at  Lambeth  it  had  much 
less  of  that  appearance.  If  it  shows  itself 
a  little  diplomatic  in  scrupling  some  cus- 
tomary terms  of  courtesy,  we  are  bound  to 
consider  the  extent  to  which  the  body  is  em- 
barrassed, in  this  matter,  by  its  antecedents, 
and  to  honor  the  contrast  which  it  now 
presents  to  the  studiously  supercilious  and 
insolent  stvle  characteristic  of  its  bad  old 
days. 

We  come  now  to  the  substance  of  the  pro- 
posed fourfold  basis  of  unity,  which  is, 
in  brief,  the  two  Testaments,  the  two  creeds, 
the  two  sacraments,  and  the  Historic  Epis- 
copate. 

On  this,  we  remark  at  the  outset,  that  in 
point  of  comprehensiveness  it  is  far  in  ad- 
vance of  other  projects  of  its  class.  On  this 
account  it  cannot  hope  for  the  approval  of 
those  whose  chief  satisfaction  with  any  plan 
of  union  or  communion  is  measured  by  the 
good  people  that  it  keeps  out.  To  such, 
the  fact  that  this  plan  extends  hospitable 
invitation  to  all  heresies  of  later  date  than 
the  fourth  century  is  inadequately  compen- 
sated by  the  fact  that  it  sternly  excludes 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  279 


such  modern  saints  as  Buckminster  and 
Charming  and  Henry  Ware  and  James 
Martineau,  and  such  as  Joseph  John  Gur- 
ney  and  Elizabeth  Fry.  The  exclusion  is 
a  serious  one  ;  but,  after  all,  it  is  doubtful 
whether  any  project  of  Christian  union  has 
been  set  forth  which  leaves  so  few  of  the 
blessed  saints  in  the  outer  darkness. 

Aside  from  these  exceptions,  it  will  not 
be  denied  that  the  various  sects  of  American 
Christians  are  as  well  agreed  with  each  other 
on  the  first  three  "articles  of  church 
unity,"  the  two  Testaments,  the  two  creeds 
and  the  two  sacraments,  as  the  Protestant 
Episcopalians  are  agreed  among  themselves. 
Of  course,  the  good  bishops  themselves  do 
not  mean  just  what  they  say  when  they 
speak  of  ' '  the  Nicene  Creed  as  the  sufficient 
statement  of  the  Christian  faith."  It  is 
doubtless  sufficient  and  more  than  sufficient 
for  some  purposes,  and  insufficient  for  some 
other  purposes  ;  otherwise  they  would  not 
keep  on  printing  the  Thirty-nine  Articles. 
Nevertheless,  as  we  have  said,  there  would 
be  no  difficulty  about  these  three  articles. 
They  are  agreed  upon  in  advance. 

It  appears,  then,  by  this  process  of  elimi- 
nation, that  there  is  only  one  condition  lack- 
ing to  enable  the  Protestant  Episcopalians 
to  come  into  that  fellowship  with  their  fel- 


280  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHDKCH 

low-Protestants  which  their  souls  long  for. 
This  sole  condition,  in  the  language  of  the 
bishops,  is  this  :  ' '  The  historic  episcopate, 
locally  adapted  in  the  methods  of  its  admin- 
istration to  the  varying  needs  of  the  nations 
and  peoples  called  of  God  into  the  unity  of 
His  Church."  Surely  the  partition  walls 
are  worn  thin,  when  this  is  all  that  remains 
to  separate.  There  is  nothing  hopeless,  at 
the  present  day,  about  this  condition.  The 
situation  is  very  different  now  from  what  it 
was  in  those  fierce  old  fighting  days  when 
Independency  and  Presbyterianism  were  as- 
serting each  its  jus  divinum,  and  denounc- 
ing black  Prelacy  as  a  Man  of  Sin  and  an 
infringement  of  the  Second  Commandment ; 
and  when  the  more  or  less  judicious  Hooker 
in  his  Polity,  and  the  mild  Stillingfleet 
in  his  emollient  "  Weapon-salve  for  the 
Church's  Wounds/'  were  meekly  pleading 
for  the  right  of  bishops  to  exist.  Nowhere 
except  in  corners  of  Scotland  and  in  some 
of  the  transplanted  Scotch  sects  is  it  easy 
to  imagine  the  old  style  of  narrow  anti-prel- 
acy as  prevailing  at  the  present  day.  The 
narrow  exclusiveness  in  this  dispute  has 
completely  passed  over  to  the  other  side. 
There  need  be  no  despair  of  a  general  con- 
sent to  the  "  Historic  Episcopate.''  But  it 
would  be  needful  to  indicate  more  distinctly 


AND   CATHOLIC    FELLOWSHIP.  281 


what  is  meant  by  the  phrase,  and  what  sort 
of  consent  to  it  was  called  for. 

What  is  meant  by  ' '  the  Historic  Episco- 
pate" ?  According  to  an  old-fashioned 
theory  still  current  among  Roman  Catholic 
scholars,  the  original  form  of  the  episco- 
pate was  the  college  of  the  twelve  apostles, 
having  a  jurisdiction  at  large  over  all 
churches.  This  ideal  is  represented  in  our 
time  by  the  powerful  organization  of  the 
Methodist  episcopate.  Probably  this  is  not 
the  historic  episcopate  to  which  our  consent 
or  conformity  is  desired. 

Beyond  all  question,  the  primitive  epis- 
copate, dating  from  the  time  when  the  form 
of  church  organization  becomes  distinctly  a 
matter  of  history,  was  an  oppidan  episco- 
pate, giving  a  bishop  to  every  town,  the 
president  of  the  town  clergy.  This  is  the 
primitive  type  of  the  bishop  of  thesub-apos- 
tolic  age.  As  we  depart  in  time  and  dis- 
tance from  the  early  centres  of  evangeliza- 
tion, we  find  ourselves  departing  from  this 
type  of  organization.  It  is  to  this  model  of 
episcopacy  that  it  would  be  most  reasonable, 
most  hopeful,  and  most  practically  useful, 
to  seek  the  consent  of  American  Christians 
in  general.  That  great  scholar  and  repre- 
sentative Puritan,  the  late  President  Wool- 
sey,  remarked  in  conversation,  "  I  would  be 


282  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL  CHURCH 

in  favor  of  an  oppidan  episcopacy/1  But, 
curiously  enough,  the  persons  most  devoted 
at  once  to  the  historic  episcopate  and  to  the 
primitive  Church  are  just  those  who  would 
be  most  sorely  discontented  and  recalcitrant 
at  the  acceptance  of  their  "  article  of  unity" 
on  this  basis  so  unmistakably  historical  and 
so  undeniably  primitive. 

Coming  down  from  the  early  ages  and 
lands  of  the  Church,  we  arrive,  in  the 
course  of  the  iron  ages  of  Christianity,  at  a 
gradual  but  revolutionary  change  in  the 
office  and  function  of  bishop.  His  jurisdic- 
tion has  widened  out  beyond  the  limits  of 
the  town  and  its  outlying  hamlets,  and 
taken  on  the  dimensions  of  a  kingdom,  in- 
cluding great  and  distant  cities  and  teeming 
populations.  There  is  a  sense,  no  doubt, 
in  which  these  novel  functionaries,  bearing 
the  old  name,  may  be  said  to  belong  to 
"  the  historic  episcopate  locally  adapted/' 
etc.  But  it  is  (to  borrow  a  phrase  from 
Oxford)  a  non-natural  sense. 

Another  departure  from  the  primitive 
and  historic  model  has  resulted,  in  the 
American  Protestant  Episcopal  Church, 
from  the  exigency,  so  naively  confessed  in 
the  preface  of  its  Book  of  Common  Prayer, 
of  organizing  itself  as  a  sect  over  against 
other  sects.     This  consists  in  the  overslaugh- 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  283 


ing  of  the  proper  authority  of  the  bishop  in 
his  own  diocese  by  the  exorbitant  powers  of  a 
periodical  synod  that  stretches  its  jurisdic- 
tion over  a  continent,  and  assumes  to  con- 
trol the  bishop  in  his  diocese  in  the  detail 
of  matters  confessedly  local  and  variable. 
Doubtless  to  have  a  sect  organized  for  more 
or  less  friendly  competition  with  other  sects, 
this  wide  divergence  from  the  ancient  and 
catholic  order  may  have  seemed  necessary. 
But  if  necessary,  it  is  a  necessary  evil.  This 
sectarian  organization— the  national  consoli- 
dation of  congregations  of  a  certain  way  of 
thinking— is  mightily  helpful  to  a  sectarian 
propaganda,  but  it  is  inevitably  a  copious 
source  of  local  schisms.  And  yet  it  is  much 
to  be  feared  that  this  hurtful  modern  per- 
version of  the  ancient  order  is  just  what 
our  good  brethren  at  Chicago  mean  by  "  the 
historic  episcopate  locally  adapted." 

There  is  yet  another  form  of  "  the  episco- 
pate adapted"  which  it  is  quite  certain  that 
there  was  no  intention  either  at  Lambeth  or 
at  Chicago  to  commend  to  the  Christian 
public  as  a  basis  of  union,  but  which,  if 
only  for  completeness  of  statement,  ought 
at  least  to  be  mentioned  here  ;  we  refer  of 
course  to  that  modification— quite  in  the 
line  of  the  others  which  we  have  considered 
—which  organizes  the  episcopate  under  a 


284  PROTESTANT  EPISCOPAL  CHURCH 


primatial  see,  and  which  has  lately  been 
urged  upon  us  as  a  basis  of  union  by  a  highly 
respected  and  venerated  clergyman  occupy- 
ing a  position  of  great  dignity  at  the  city  of 
Rome.  It  might  perhaps  have  been  sup- 
posed that  this  proposal  would  fall  in  with 
the  liberal  ideas  of  "  adaptation"  entertained 
by  the  bishops  at  Lambeth,  opening  a  way 
toward  that  larger  fellowship  to  which  they 
aspire.  But  from  some  remarks  on  the 
subject  from  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury, 
we  conclude  that  in  the  matter  of  "  adapt- 
ing the  historic  episcopate"  he  draws  the 
line  just  at  that  point.  And  a  very  happy 
circumstance  it  was  for  his  Grace  that  he 
happened  to  take  this  view  of  the  case, 
thereby  avoiding  all  risk  of  the  penalties  of 
'praemunire. 

Evidently  we  can  hope  for  no  progress 
toward  Christian  union  on  this  basis  of 
"  the  historical  episcopate  adapted,''  until 
we  come  to  a  little  more  distinct  understand- 
ing of  what  is  meant  by  the  phrase. 

There  is  yet  another  point,  of  not  less 
practical  importance,  that  requires  explana- 
tion. Of  what  sort,  in  the  mind  of  the 
proposers,  is  to  be  the  application  of  their 
condition  of  church  unity  ?  It  seems  to  be 
intended  to  require  assent  or  consent  of 
some  kind.     Is  it  their  idea  to  demand  as- 


AND   CATHOLIC  FELLOWSHIP.  285 


sent  to  their  theory  of  church  polity  ?  But 
they  have  no  theory.  It  would  be  impossi- 
ble to  frame  in  language  a  theory  of  church 
order  on  which  they  would  be  agreed  among 
themselves.  It  must  be  safe  for  us  to  pre- 
sume that  they  mean  to  exact  nothing  more 
in  the  way  of  assent  than  is  required  in  their 
own  ordinal ;  and  that,  according  to  our 
recollection,  is  the  easiest  possible.  There 
is  no  difficulty  just  here.  That  man  must 
be  a  hopeless  sectarian  indeed  who  cannot 
find  a  sense  in  which  he  can  assent  to  "  the 
historic  episcopate, "  in  the  writings  of  such 
distinguished  Anglican  ecclesiastics  as  (for 
instance)  Archbishop  Whately  and  Bishop 
Lightfoot,  and  Deans  Alford  and  Stanley, 
and  Dr.  Hatch. 

But  here  comes  a  more  embarrassing 
question  :  To  whom  is  this  conditional 
proffer  of  Christian  fellowship  tendered? 
Is  it  to  individuals  ?  Let  us  hope  so,  for  in 
this  case  difficulties  of  the  gravest  sort  are 
avoided,  and  a  door  of  hope  is  opened  to 
the  Episcopal  Church  in  America  in  the 
direction  of  a  more  catholic  communion. 
(We  say  "  in  America,"  for  it  is  only  here 
that  the  question  is  a  practical  one.  It  is 
very  pleasant  to  read  the  fraternal  expres- 
sions of  English  bishops,  but  really  they 
have  about  as  little  control  over  the  matter 


286  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL  CHURCH 

as  a  convention  of  sextons  would  have. 
With  them  it  is  a  matter  for  Parliament, 
and  especially  for  that  somewhat  mixed 
body,  the  House  of  Commons,  whose  su- 
premacy in  such  matters  is  an  "  adaptation 
of  the  historic  episcopate"  which  we  hope 
will  not  be  too  strenuously  insisted  on. 
The  utterances  of  the  American  bishops  are 
of  more  importance.  They  have  not  indeed 
authority  over  the  matter,  and  there  is  room 
for  painful  doubt  whether  they  could  "  carry 
their  constituencies' '  in  favor  of  measures 
to  give  practical  effect  to  their  sentiments. 
But  they  have  at  least  votes  and  a  share  of 
power,  and  weighty  and  well -deserved  influ- 
ence.) 

To  return  from  this  long  parenthesis  :  if 
these  overtures  and  conditions  of  fellowship 
are  tendered  to  Christians  and  Christian 
ministers  as  individuals,  the  way  is  open  at 
once  for  accepting  them.  We  will  under- 
take, if  allowed  a  brief  time  for  correspond- 
ence, to  find  and  present  to  any  one  of  the 
bishops  who  voted  at  Chicago,  a  company 
of  godly  and  well-learned  men,  approved 
and  honored  as  faithful  ministers  of  the 
Gospel,  and  undeniably  conformed  to  the 
four  prescribed  conditions,  who  will  gladly 
accept  the  fellowship  of  the  bishops  in  the 
same  sincere  and  brotherly  spirit  in  which 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  28? 


it  is  proffered.     What  is  the  sort  of  hos- 
pitality to  which  they  will  find  themselves 
welcomed  ?     First,    they   will    be    put    in 
quarantine  for  twelve  months,  during  which 
they  will  be  interdicted  from  all  the  duties 
and  privileges   of  the  Christian  ministry. 
This  being  passed,  they  will  be  admissible 
to  the  narrowly  circumscribed  fellowship  of 
the  bishops  and  their  clergy,  on  condition 
of   severing  themselves  by  permanent  and 
irretrievable  schism  from  the  general  com- 
munion of  American  churches  and  minis- 
ters.    Still  another  condition  besides    the 
four  named  at  Lambeth  and  Chicago  they 
will  find  to  be  rigorously  exacted,  to  wit, 
that  they  shall  conduct  the  offices  of  public 
worship  always  in  conformity  to  an  ancient 
Act  of  the  English  Parliament  (1  Edw.  vi.), 
which  seems  to  be  looked  upon  as  univer- 
sally and  divinely  obligatory  upon  American 
Christians  ;  and  that  they  shall  refuse  to  do 
the  duty  of  preachers  of  the  Gospel  to  con- 
gregations worshipping  by  a  different  rite. 

If,  writing  without  opportunity  of  recon- 
sulting  the  canons  that  cover  the  case,  we 
have  made  any  important  mistake  as  to  the 
course  prescribed,  we  shall  gladly  accept 
corrections.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  our 
statement  is  substantially  correct,  in  what 
sort  of  light  does  it  leave  the  Lambeth-Chi- 


288  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 

cago  overtures  for  Church  unity  ?  We  are 
confident  that  those  overtures  were  offered 
with  a  genuine  sentimental  sincerity  ;  but 
practically  what  better  are  they  than  a 
plausible  and  not  very  ingenuous  bid  for 
proselytes  ? 

The  answer  to  all  these  difficulties  must 
needs  be  that  the  four  "  Lambeth  articles" 
(to  use  an  old  phrase  in  its  new  application) 
are  not  intended  to  apply  to  individuals, 
but  are  only  offered  as  a  basis  of  negotiation 
with  other  sects  or  "religious  bodies. " 
The  statement  confronts  us  with  difficulties 
still  more  formidable.  The  former  difficul- 
ties could  be  removed  by  the  amendment  of 
a  few  arbitrary  canons.  We  now  meet  with 
difficulties  that  are  deeper  seated. 

Waiving  the  very  great  but  not  desperate 
difficulties  of  opening  and  conducting  nego- 
tiations and  then  of  securing  the  ratification 
of  them  on  the  part  of  both  the  high  con- 
tracting parties — supposing  these,  by  the 
grace  of  God,  brought  to  a  successful  issue, 
and  terms  of  union  or  confederation  agreed 
on  with  the  leading  "  religious  bodies"  on 
the  basis  of  the  historic  episcopate — what 
then  ?  Why,  then,  doubtless,  with  the  nec- 
essary modifications  of  its  canons  (which  can 
just  as  well  be  modified  without  such  diplo- 
macy as  with  it),  the  Protestant  Episcopal 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  289 


Church  would  be  let  out  from  its  seclusion 
— a  most  happy  and  desirable  event.  But 
would  the  common  historic  episcopate  thus 
conferred  have  so  much  as  a  tendency  to 
promote  the  unity  of  the  church  ?  Would 
it  not  tend  rather  to  the  sanctioning,  the 
confirming,  and  the  exasperating  of  schism  ? 
Let  us  look  soberly  into  these  questions. 

Two  plans  have  been  suggested  for  the 
uniting  of  the  church  on  the  basis  of  the 
episcopate.  One  is  that  the  "  religious 
bodies"  should  be  consolidated  under  one 
government  in  which  all  should  be  repre- 
sented, and  in  which  each  should  have  full 
liberty  within  the  easy  limits  of  "  the  quad- 
rilateral." The  other  is,  that  without  at- 
tempting governmental  consolidation,  there 
should  be  communicated  to  representatives 
of  each  of  the  "  religious  bodies"  that  which 
constitutes  the  essential  historicity  of  the 
episcopate.  If  there  is  a  tertium  quid  to 
this  alternative  we  are  not  informed  of  it. 
The  first  course  would  give  us  a  huge  cor- 
poration, the  constituent  members  of  which 
would  be,  not  "  faithful  men,"  but  organ- 
ized and  embattled  sects  trained  and  drilled 
through  ages  of  schism  to  the  practice  of 
competition  and  emulation  and  other 
"  works  of  the  flesh/'  The  second  course 
would  give  us  just  what  we  have  now — this 


290  PROTESTANT    EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 

scandal  of  scrambling,  hustling,  and  com- 
peting sects,  holding  nevertheless  quite  sin- 
cerely certain  terms  of  fraternal  fellowship 
with  each  other — with  only  this  difference, 
that  thenceforth  the  Protestant  Episco- 
palians, perhaps  the  most  shamelessly 
scrambling  and  hustling  "  religious  body" 
of  the  lot,  would  feel  itself  at  liberty,  with- 
out sacrifice  of  its  dignity  and  consistency, 
to  fraternize  along  with  the  rest. 

Is  it  possible  that  any  have  been  dreaming 
that  the  historic  episcopate  would  change 
the  elements  of  human  nature?  Happily 
we  are  not  left  without  experimental  proofs 
on  this  point,  and  these  nigh  at  hand.  Our 
brethren  of  "  the  Roman  obedience"  have 
an  historic  episcopate — very  historic  indeed, 
as  well  as  in  a  high  degree  "  locally  adapt- 
ed"— but  it  seems  to  have  had  no  effect 
whatever  in  bringing  them  into  exception- 
ally fraternal  relations  with  their  historically 
episcopal  neighbors  ;  in  fact,  the  effect  of 
it,  as  far  as  visible,  seems  exactly  the  re- 
verse. A  case  quite  in  point  is  that  of  the 
Moravian  Church — name  never  to  be  men- 
tioned without  love  and  veneration — which 
was  in  occupation  here  with  its  bishops  forty 
years  before  the  Episcopalians,  and  whose 
historic  episcopacy  is  certified  by  the  highest 
authority  in  the  English  Church,  an  Act  of 


AND   CATHOLIC    FELLOWSHIP.  291 


Parliament ;  but  what  token  of  favor  or  fel- 
lowship has  it  ever  had  from  the  Protestant 
Episcopal  Church  ?     So  far  as  we  are  aware, 
only  this  :  that  the  amiable  Bishop  Stevens 
was  kind  enough  to  reordain  a  Moravian 
presbyter   in  order   to  give  him  "a  more 
ample  ordination  ;"  and  this  is  an  amplifi- 
cation that  any  of  us  might  have  had  on  the 
same  terms.     There  is  still   another  case, 
which  can  hardly  have  occurred  to  the  minds 
of  the  bishops  at  Chicago  when  they  were 
yearning  for  union  with  their  Protestant 
brethren  on  the  basis  of  the    two  Testa- 
ments, the  two  Creeds,  the  two  Sacraments, 
and  the  Historic  Episcopate.    Close  at  hand 
was  the  very  object  of  their  hearts'  desire. 
And  yet  we  do  not  remember  to  have  read, 
in  any  account  of  their  meeting,  of  their 
having  sent  a  special  message  to  the  Right 
Reverend  Bishop  Cheney  and  his  presby- 
ters, and  of  his  being  received  by  them  with 
embraces  and  effusive  expressions  of  frater- 
nal delight.     It  may  have  happened,  but  we 
have  seen  no  record  of  it.    We  are  not  ques- 
tioning in  the  slightest  the  personal  respect 
and  affection  with  which  this  eminent  and 
excellent  partner  of  theirs  in  the  historic 
episcopate   is  regarded   by   them   in   their 
hearts.     But  so  far  as  strictly  ecclesiastical 
fellowship  is  concerned,  we  have  seen  no 


292  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 


evideuce    that    the     Reformed    Episcopal 
Church,    for  all   its    Testaments,    Creeds, 
Sacraments,    and    Episcopate,   comes    any 
nearer   to   satisfying   the   longings   of   the 
bishops  for   union   with   somebody,   some- 
where, than  the  "  religious  bodies'*  that  are 
less  distinctly  conformed  to  the  four  condi- 
tions.    In  fact,  all  indications  are  directly  to 
the  contrary.     By  reason  of  the  closeness  of 
its  filial  likeness,  the  Reformed  Episcopal 
Church  is  a  less  eligible  object  of  fellowship 
than  we  who  are  afar  off.     In  the  language 
of  the  poet  Gilbert,  it  is  "  too,  too  ail-but. " 
We  cannot  resist  the  conviction  that  the 
bishops  at  Chicago,  good,  honest  brethren 
speaking  out  of  the  sincerity  of  their  hearts, 
nevertheless  do  not  know  their  own  minds 
in  this  matter.     If  there  is  any  instruction 
in  their  own  history  and  in  Church  history 
generally,  the  more  nearly  any  one  of  the 
other  "  religious  bodies"  is  approximated  to 
them,  the  more  unwilling  they  would  be  to 
have  fraternal  relations  with  it. 

Let  us  prognosticate  a  little.  Suppose  ne- 
gotiations on  the  "quadrilateral"  basis  to 
have  been  successfully  concluded  by  which  the 
two  leading  bodies  of  Presbyterians,  North 
and  South  (about  7000  ministers  and  1,000,- 
000  communicants),  and  of  Methodists, 
North  and  South   (about  20,000  ministers 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  293 


and   3,500,000   communicants),  should   be 
united    with     the     Protestant    Episcopal 
Church  (about  4000  ministers  and  500,000 
communicants)  ;  the   resultant  either  will 
be  a  governmental  consolidation  or  it  will 
not  be.     If  the  former,  will  any  imagina- 
tion venture  to  forecast  the  course  of  debate 
and  business  in  the  first  General  Synod  or 
Council  of  the  new  Church,  when  (for  in- 
stance) the  question  arises  whether  the  Rev- 
erend Dr.  Briggs  is  taken  in  or  left  outside 
by  the  first  of  the  four  conditions  of  union  ? 
If  the  latter,  in  what  respect  is  the  inter- 
communion among  the  sects  confederating 
on  the  quadrilateral  basis,  of  any  greater 
efficacy  for  good  than  the  intercommunion 
already  existing  among  what  are  called  the 
evangelical  denominations,  except  that  the 
new  arrangement  will  take  in  the  Episco- 
palians ?    The  existing  intercommunion,  on 
the   basis  of  common  faith  and  hope  and 
genuine  though  imperfect  mutual  love  and 
respect,  does  not  suffice  to  save  the  country, 
and  especially  the  West,  from  wasteful  and 
scandalous  competitions.    Is  there  the  ghost 
of  a  reason  for  thinking  that  by  adding  to 
this  basis  the  common  claim  to  a  historic 
episcopate  the  practical  mischiefs  of  schism 
would  be  one  whit  diminished  ? 

It  is  not  even  probable  that  the  desired 


294  PROTESTANT  EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 

union  would  diminish  the  number  of  sects. 
The  King  of  Prussia  had  two  Protestant 
sects  in  his  dominion  ;  he  was  resolved  to 
have  only  one  ;  when  he  had  got  through 
with  his  work  he  found  that  he  had  three. 
The  Roman  missionaries  in  the  East  mourn- 
ed over  the  division  of  Eastern  Christians  ; 
they  labored  strenuously  to  draw  all  to- 
gether on  a  basis  not  wholly  unlike  the 
"  quadrilateral  ;"  they  succeeded  so  well 
that  at  last  they  had  nearly  twice  as  many 
sects  as  there  were  to  begin  with,  with  the 
Latin  sect  to  boot.  Is  there  any  practical 
lesson  in  these  bits  of  history  ? 

If  we  may  imagine  the  proposed  unifica- 
tion to  go  on  so  near  to  achievement  as  that 
the  number  of  sects  in  our  American  Chris- 
tendom should  be  reduced  to  two,  we  should 
then  be  farther  from  our  end  than  before, 
by  as  much  as  that  the  intensity  and  acri- 
mony of  sectarian  animosity  would  then  be 
raised  to  its  highest  power. 

We  cannot  regard  the  present  critical 
position  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  com- 
munion in  relation  to  church  union,  amia- 
ble and  praiseworthy  as  it  is,  without  some- 
thing of  anxiety  lest  the  general  interests  of 
the  One  Church  suffer  detriment.  It  would 
be  a  serious  loss  to  the  true  cause  of  Chris- 
tian  unity  if,    through   the   impatience  of 


AND   CATHOLIC  FELLOWSHIP.  200 


Episcopalians  with  an  irksome  isolation,  the 
Church  of  America  should  lose  the  benefit 
of  their  unwelcome  but  salutary  protest 
against  the  sin  of  schism.  Almost  all  the 
other  Protestant  sects  have  lapsed  into  the 
habit  of  regarding  schism  as  the  right  and 
normal  order  of  the  church.  We  all  recog- 
nize the  common  strain  of  talk  at  Evangeli- 
cal Alliance  meetings  and  like  occasions, 
how  that  the  separate  sects  (we  beg  pardon — 
denominations)  are  ordered  by  Divine  wis- 
dom, and  the  more  of  them  the  better  ;  how 
that  the  prismatic  colors  blend  into  the 
white  light  ;  how  that  the  horse,  the  foot, 
the  artillery,  and  the  sharpshooters  combine 
to  make  up  the  sacramental  host  ;  how  com- 
petition is  the  life  of  business  and  emulation 
one  of  the  works  of  the  Spirit ;  but  never- 
theless how  beautiful  it  is,  like  the  oint- 
ment upon  the  head  of  Aaron,  for  brethren 
to  dwell  together  in  unity  now  and  then 
for  an  hour  at  a  Tract  Society  meeting 
or  an  Evangelical  Alliance  !  In  the  midst  of 
this  general  defection  from  the  foundation 
principles  of  the  church,  it  has  been  a 
wholesome,  thing  for  us  to  be  forced  to  listen 
to  the  persistent,  uncompromising  protest 
against  all  this  cant,  from  one  of  the  minor 
sects.  The  fidelity  with  which  this  protest  has 
been  reiterated  in  men's  reluctant  ears  may 


296  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 

well  be  called  heroic.  Against  affectionate 
entreaties,  against  angry  denunciations  of 
bigotry,  and  narrowness,  and  Pharisaism,  the 
little  party  of  High  Church  Episcopalians, 
itself  the  merest  sect  of  a  sect,  has  answered 
all  invitations  from  its  "  sister  churches" 
with  stout  denials  :  "  you  are  not  sister 
churches,  you  are  only  sects  ;  there  is  only 
one  Church,  and  we  are  it  ;  sects  have  no 
right  to  exist.  You  ought,  all  of  you,  to 
come  into  the  Church,  the  ark  of  safety,  in- 
stead of  lingering  without,  having  no  hope 
except  in  the  uncovenanted  mercies  ;  espe- 
cially you  who  are  assuming  to  act  as  min- 
isters of  these  religious  bodies,  you  are  in- 
volved in  the  guilt  of  Korah,  and  Dathan, 
and  Abiram  ;  if  you  wish  our  fellowship  in 
the  ministry,  you  must  be  admitted  to  it  in 
the  only  way — through  ordination  by  the 
historic  episcopate,  of  which  we  hold  the 
monopoly."  Not  only  against  denuncia- 
tion and  entreaty  has  this  protest  asserted 
itself,  but  (what  is  harder  to  bear)  against 
the  frequent  smile  and  the  occasional  laugh. 
For  it  is  impossible  to  deny  that  the  situa- 
tion has  sometimes  been  extremely  funny. 
But  it  has  been  bravely  persisted  in  never- 
theless— all  the  more  honor  to  the  conscien- 
tious illogical  brethren  who  so  stuck  to 
their  principles  without  seeing  the  humor- 


AND    CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  297 

ous  aspects  or  the  moral  consequences  of 
them. 

It  is  a  matter  of  serious  anxiety  to  ob- 
serve, with  the  vigorous  growth  of  "  Broad" 
principles,  a  weakening  of  this  sturdy  and 
long-sustained  protest,  and  a  disposition  (as 
in  this  "  quadrilateral' '  manifesto)  to  fall 
into  the  easy,  popular  course  of  compromise 
with  sectarianism.  The  hope  of  church 
unity  does  not  lie  that  way.  Negotiation 
among  sects  as  such  can  lead  to  nothing 
higher  than  a  union  among  sects  as  such, 
and  a  union  of  sects  as  such  never  can  be 
the  Church.  A  confederation  of  sects  wears 
no  seamless  robe  ;  its  proper  drapery  is  a 
crazy-quilt. 

We  are  reluctant  to  let  go  the  long-cher- 
ished hope  that  some  time  a  logical  mind 
would  be  raised  up  in  the  High  Church 
party  among  the  Episcopalians  who  should 
show  his  brethren  what  their  position  im- 
plies. This  party,  which  has  long  been 
completely  dominant  in  that  "  religious 
body,"  has  never  really  taken  itself  serious- 
ly. Otherwise  it  could  not  have  helped  see- 
ing that  by  "  High"  principles  it  was  bound 
in  conscience  to  the  broadest  of  broad  poli- 
cies. It  has  claimed  for  its  communion, 
' '  this  is  not  a  sect,  or  a  denomination,  this 
is  the  Holy  Catholic  Church  for  America. 


298  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 


This    is  the   one   channel   of    sacramental 
grace,  outside  of  which  are  no  covenanted 
mercies.     This  alone  can  confer  that  au- 
thority without  which  the  assumption  of 
the  duties  of  the  Christian  ministry  is  an 
awful  sacrilege.     This   is   the   one   ark  of 
safety."     But  instead   of   feeling  the  mo- 
mentous responsibility  of  such  a  trust,  and 
flinging   wide   the   happy  gates  of   Gospel 
grace,  and  offering  welcome  to  all  believers, 
it  has  planted  itself  across  the  gang-plank 
of  the  ark  and  forbidden  entrance  to  all  but 
those  who  conformed  to  a  confessedly  arbi- 
trary system  of  rules  of  etiquette.     Its  com- 
munion claims  to  be  the  Church  Catholic  ; 
but  is  "  run"  in  the  spirit  of  the  narrowest 
and  most  sectarian  of  sects.    Liberal  enough 
where  narrowness  might  have  been  excusable, 
solemnly  strict  at  points  at  which  it  was 
bound  by  its  confessed  principles  to  be  free- 
handed and  comprehensive,  it  would  seem 
to  have  taken  for  its  government  an  ancient 
and  most  catholic  maxim,  "locally  adapt- 
ed" to  its  own  temper  and  convenience  : 
in  necessariis  Ubertas ;  in  non-necessariis 
unit  as. 

If  that  should  come  to  pass  which  seems 
indicated  by  the  signs  of  the  times,  and  the 
High  Church  party  in  the  Episcopal  Church, 
having  had  everything  its  own  way  for  so 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  299 


long,  should  be  superseded  in  its  dominant 
position  by  the  young  and  able  and  rapidly 
growing  Broad  Church  party,  we  should 
feel  that  while  something  had  been  gained 
by  the  change,  a  valuable  opportunity  had 
been  missed  and  wasted,  and  a  door  of  hope 
for  the  peace  and  unity  of  the  Church  of 
America  had  been  shut  fast.  We  venture  to 
repeat  here  language  that  was  written  just 
twenty-one  years  ago  on  the  occasion  of  Dr. 
Dollinger's  forgotten  little  Christian  Union 
convention  at  Bonn  : 

The  hopeful  way  out  of  the  practical  difficulties 
of  schism,  especially  in  America,  is  not  that  of 
diplomacy  among  doctors  of  divinity  of  various 
sects,  but  that  which  begins  at  the  other  end,  with 
seeking  a  way  of  reconciling  local  sectarian  divi- 
sions in  little  villages.     I  believe  that  the  Episco- 
pal Church  in  America,  if  it  only  knew  its  mis- 
sion, has  some  grand  advantages  for  this  work 
If  it  could  rid  itself  of  sundry  canons  that  bind  it 
hand  and  foot,  abate  a  little  of  that  high-and- 
mighty  tone  which  is  so  apt  to  make  people  smile 
and  apply  to  such  a  ministry  of  reconciliation  one 
half  of  the  energy  now  expended  in  fomenting 
local  schisms  at  home  and  in  begging  for  recognf- 
tion  and  Christian  union  at  the  ends  of  the  earth 
it  might  do  a  great  thing  for  itself,  and  a  greater 
thing   for  American  Christianity,  and  make  all 
other  Christian  communions  grateful  to  it  in  spite 
of  themselves. 

0  Jerusalem,  if  thou  hadst  known  ! 


300  PliOTESTANt    EPISCOPAL   CHOIiCH 


We  commend  to  the  bishops  who  spoke 
at  Lambeth  and  at  Chicago,  and  to  the 
"  religions  bodies"  who  may  be  attracted 
by  their  proposals,  the  study  of  the  system, 
and  methods,  and  traditions  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church.  There  are  greater  and 
better  things  to  be  studied  in  that  venerable 
institution  than  those  matters  of  pomp  and 
pageant  and  millinery  that  engage  the  at- 
tention of  petty  minds.  There  is  its  sense 
of  duty  and  responsibility  and  its  scale  of 
missionary  endeavor,  not  wholly  out  of  pro- 
portion to  the  magnificence  of  its  preten- 
sions. There  is  its  elasticity  in  adapting  it- 
self "  to  the  varying  needs  of  the  nations 
and  peoples"  of  which  we  see  a  signal  and 
admirable  illustration  before  us  in  the  United 
States  at  this  very  time.  There  is  its  dis- 
tinction, clearly  recognized,  if  not  always 
justly  drawn,  between  the  variable  things 
and  the  constant  things  in  Christianity. 
And  withal  (a  matter  which  the  popular 
impressions  completely  misconceive)  there  is 
its  faculty,  of  which  Anglicanism  has  shown 
a  characteristic  insular  and  John-Bullish 
incapacity,  of  comprehending  within  the 
harmony  of  a  single  system  diverse  races, 
languages,  rites,  disciplines,  theologies,  and 
temperaments.  It  does  not  insist  that  the 
Eastern  nations  shall  learn  the  Latin  Ian- 


AND  CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  301 

guage  or  adopt  the  Roman  rite.  It  per- 
mits among  them  a  married  clergy,  and 
holds  itself  free  at  its  discretion  to  introduce 
the  same  liberty  among  the  Western  na- 
tions. It  admits  (though  it  tries  to  discour- 
age them)  traditional  variations  of  ritual 
"  use''  in  individual  dioceses.  But  espe- 
cially it  admits  diverse  and  sharply  contro- 
versial schools  of  doctrinal  theology,  main- 
taining each  its  separate  missions  and  its 
separate  congregations,  and  cultivating  each 
its  favorite  specialties  in  religious  work,  in- 
citing each  other  with  a  perilous  intensity 
of  emulation  and  even  envy,  and,  strangest 
of  all,  keeping  up  each  its  own  discipline, 
independent  of  the  authority  of  the  episco- 
pate. In  short,  that  which  in  Protestant- 
ism would  be  a  schism,  tearing  itself  from 
the  Church  with  ruthless  rending,  and  or- 
ganizing itself  into  a  sect  of  aggravated  and 
acrimonious  temper,  under  the  masterly 
statesmanship  of  the  Roman  polity  is  geared 
into  its  complex  machinery  and  becomes  an 
Order  in  the  Church.*     Is  there  in  all  this 


*  We  would  like  to  be  informed  by  any  who  are  skilled  in 
the  literature  of  the  subject,  whether  the  striking  analogy 
between  the  sects  in  the  fellowship  of  Protestantism,  and  the 
Orders  in  the  unity  of  the  Roman  Church,  has  ever  been 
brought  out  in  its  instructive  details.  Protestantism,  as  well 
as  the  Catholic  Church,  has  its  Benedictines,  its  Dominicans, 
its  Jesuits,  and  its  Capuchins,  to  say  nothing  of  other  mendi- 


302  PROTESTANT   EPISCOPAL   CHURCH 

no  instruction  and  warning  to  be  laid  to 
heart  by  an  institution  that  is  in  danger  of 

cant  orders.  It  may  justly  be  claimed,  on  the  one  hand,  that 
under  the  visible  divisions  of  Protestantism  there  is  an  un- 
derlying unity  ;  as  on  the  other  hand  it  would  have  to  be  con- 
ceded that  under  the  formal  union  of  the  Orders  under  the 
obedience  of  the  Holy  See,  there  have  sometimes  raged  the 
fiercest  passions  of  sectarian  hatred.  The  story  of  the  mutual 
animosities  of  the  different  Orders  of  missionaries  in  China 
could  not  easily  be  paralleled  from  the  history  of  the  Protes- 
tant sects.  But  all  things  considered,  it  is  wonderful  and  ad- 
mirable how  little  there  is,  or,  at  least,  how  little  there  is 
known,  of  violent  discord  or  mischievous  competition  in  so 
complicated  and  risky  an  organization  as  the  organization  of 
the  regular  Orders  inside  the  lines  of  the  secular  hierarchy, 
but  independent  of  its  authority. 

Every  one  will  recall  the  strong  antitheses  of  Macaulay  in 
contrasting  the  comprehensiveness  of  the  Roman  Church 
with  the  martinet  rigidity  of  the  English.  "At  Rome,  the 
Countess  of  Huntingdon  would  have  a  place  in  the  Calendar  as 
St.  Selina,  and  Mrs.  Fry  would  be  foundress  and  first  Superior 
of  the  Blessed  Order  of  Sisters  of  the  Gaols.  Place  Ignatius 
Loyola  at  Oxford.  He  is  certain  to  become  the  head  of  a  for- 
midable secession.  Place  John  Wesley  at  Rome.  He  is  cer- 
tain to  be  the  first  General  of  a  new  Society  devoted  to  the 
interests  and  honor  of  the  Church."  We  are  aware  that  the 
author  quoted  is  not  a  favorite  in  the  American  Episcopal 
Church ;  but  for  all  that,  this  passage  from  the  review  of 
Ranke  contains  "wholesome  doctrine"  for  it  "and  suited  to 
these  times." 

Of  course  the  likeness  between  the  Orders  of  the  Roman 
Church  and  the  sects  of  Protestantism  does  not  extend  to 
all  points.  The  division  between  the  Orders  goes  no  further 
down  than  the  clergy  ;  the  layman  is  neither  Dominican  nor 
Franciscan,  but  simply  Catholic.  Among  Protestants  the  par- 
titions cut  down  to  the  lowest  strata  of  the  people.  In  like 
manner  in  the  other  direction,  at  Rome,  the  division  extends 
upward  ae  far  as  the  General  of  the  Order,  but  is  limited  by 
the  paramount  authority  of  the  Vicar  of  Christ ;  among  Prot- 
estants the  division  extends  on  and  up,  limited  only  by  the 
paramount  authority  of  Christ  himself,  when  this  authority  is 
able  to  get  a  hearing  for  itself. 


AND   CATHOLIC   FELLOWSHIP.  303 


combining  lofty  pretensions  to  the  ex- 
clusive authority  and  communion  of  the 
Catholic  Church  with  the  narrowness  and 
light-minded  irresponsibility  of  a  Protestant 
sect  ?  The  Lambeth  and  Chicago  mani- 
festo seems  to  betoken  that  the  leaders  of 
Anglicanism  have  begun  to  get  a  glimpse 
of  their  false  position.  Unhappily  it  seems 
also  to  indicate  that  they  are  ready  to  fall 
into  a  new  position  no  less  false  than  the 
old. 


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